Diasporic Palestinian filmmaker Serene Husni returns in 2016 for the first time to her parents’ hometown of Jenin, from which they fled when Israel occupied the West Bank in 1967. Attempting to create a portrait of contemporary Jenin, she begins filming: the city, its villages, and refugee camp, complementing these impressions with footage from the family archive.
Conversations with farmers, market vendors, and elders help her understand what her camera can and cannot capture. In voice-over, she reflects on what she encounters: stories of the Nakba and the occupation, of land confiscations and the Wall, and of watermelons that now come from Israel. She also films children at play, who are nonetheless aware of what is happening around them.
There is perseverance and sometimes also hope. A Palestinian family enjoys a picnic on land which settlers have left, albeit temporarily. Husni made the film over a decade, during which daily life under occupation grew ever more difficult and Israeli military presence increasingly conspicuous. With much of the film shot shortly before October 7, the film offers a haunting record of a Palestinian community on the eve of violent erasure.
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