Trust No One - a new Israeli TV series on Netflix

 A new Israeli TV series has become available on Netflix this past week.  Trust No One (הראש) is a suspenseful spy thriller about the functioning of Israel’s General Security Services agency, better known as the Shin Bet.  The series was created by Ron Leshem, Amit Cohen, Daniel Amsel and directed by Ofir Lobel and was produced for Keshet (one of the major Israeli television networks) by Shenhar Productions.

The series focuses on a fictional head of the Shin Bet, Itamar Molcho (played by Yehuda Levi), his family, his elite team of top-level associates whom he trusts with his life, and the operatives/assets/informants that they run in Gaza.  When someone dumps files on the internet about their operatives (in Wiki-leaks style), everyone must rush to first, save the lives of the operatives who have now been exposed, and second, search out the mole who has been leaking their top-secret information to the internet.  Add to this lots of illegal shenanigans, lots of sexual tension, and complications that keep leaving the viewer wanting more. Needless to say, everyone has secrets to hide, and you cannot keep up with the array of suspects!

The main storyline centers around Shuruk, the daughter of a Hamas Sheikh in Gaza, who is a Shin Ben operative. We recognize here that this is based on a true story from the 1990s -- the son of a founder of Hamas, Moab Hassan Yousef, became a spy for the Shin Bet in a high profile story. Another part of the story that is based on real life -- the Head of the Shin Bet is having his reputation and career questioned by the Prime Minister. We are all mindful that there has been a current controversy between the Head of the Shin Bet and the Prime Minister of Israel, which makes this series highly relevant.

I loved this series, but there is a major element which I found troublesome. The series  was produced before October 7th, but it is all about information gathering in the Gaza Strip. If the drones, cameras, and cyber specialists at the Shin Bet, as portrayed in this dramatic series, provide Israel with so much knowledge of what is going on in Gaza on a regular basis, then how did the October 7^th disaster occur without serious intelligence warnings?

Nevertheless, Trust No One is a great series, a thriller with lots of twists and turns. So well-made and highly recommended!

Trust No One (TV series, 9 episodes, 2025) is currently streaming on Keshet or on Netflix.

Our Boys is a Triumph!

This is my second posting about Our Boys, a TV series of 10 episodes, created by Hagai Levi, Joseph Cedar and Tawfik Abu-Wael (two Jewish Israeli filmmakers and one Palestinian Israeli filmmaker).  

The series is based on an historical re-enactment of terrible murders that took place in Israel-Palestine during the summer of 2014, and is being broadcast on HBO in North America and Keshet in Israel.

If you are looking for the story of the kidnapping and murder of the three Yeshivah boys – Gilad, Eyal and Naftali, and the subsequent military search for the Palestinian terrorists who committed this crime, then this is not that film.  

This TV series focuses on the subsequent revenge attack, equally shocking and repulsive, perpetrated on a Palestinian youth by Jewish terrorists.

The series is very well-acted and directed, extremely hard-hitting and amazingly realistic.  In brief, it is a triumph!  But keep in mind that the subject is very difficult.  See my previous posting for info concerning the story-line.

My husband and I went to the preview screening of the final episode at the JCC on the Upper West Side in Manhattan a few days ago. The screening was followed by a discussion with two of the filmmakers, Joseph Cedar (Norman, Footnote, Time of Favor, Campfire) and Tawfik Abu-Wael (Thirst), moderated by Yitzi Zablocki, director of the JCC film center. The discussion opened my eyes to so many things about the series, including the creative process of working collaboratively and some of the difficult societal issues brought up in the script.

Identifying with the Pain of the parents of the victim

A fair amount was talked about concerning the series’ success in humanizing the characters, both Israeli and Palestinian, so that viewers would empathize with their personal anguish and would understand them better. Abu-Wael felt that they were dealing with a taboo story in both societies, so there was the need to fully empathize with the other side. He lives in Tel Aviv and he was proud to declare that one of his Israeli Jewish friends told him that in this show, you can identify with the Palestinian pain. He concluded by stating that “when you humanize your enemy, you humanize yourself.” 

Indeed, as I viewed this series, I became intensely involved with the human tragic stories and serious moral dilemmas of so many of the characters: the Palestinian father and mother of the boy who was so brutally murdered; the agent for the Shabak (Shin Bet security services) who did the best he could in extremely trying circumstances, but was conflicted whether he did the right thing vis a vis the youngest of the Jewish perpetrators of the murder; the psychiatrist, who held her ground, despite lots of pressure to declare her patient mentally unfit to stand trial; and the rabbi/father/grandfather who struggled also to do the right thing for his family.

Insanity as a defense strategy

The lawyer for the main suspect in the murder trial presented a defense of mental incapacity.  Cedar said that theoretically one might have thought that the establishment (the government, the prosecutor and the Shabak) would have wanted him to be declared insane and this would have allowed most Jews to breathe a sigh of relief and to consider this occurrence as an aberration.  But the Shabak in the TV series reaches the opposite conclusion -- a guilty charge for all three boys would be preferable to an insanity plea because of fear of public opinion and pressure in Israel and the world, and also because it would help deter the future growth of the movement of the right-wing Jewish fanatics.

Within the ultra-orthodox community, a lot of pressure was put on Devorah, the psycho-therapist (who was actually a composite figure based on two female therapists in Jerusalem), to certify that the main suspect was incapable of testifying.  According to Cedar, Devorah, however, had the courage to say “no” to the need for people to blame this all on one psychotic young man, which would have whitewashed a deeper problem within Israeli society. 

The Process of Collaborative Work

Cedar worked on writing and directing the scenes with the Jewish Israeli characters.  Abu-Wael worked on the Palestinian scenes.  In fact, the family of Mohammed Abu Khdeir saw Abu-Wael as their representative who was retelling their story.  In so doing, both directors made an honest and authentic attempt at presenting both narratives, and multiple sub-narratives on each side.  Both Cedar and Abu-Wael discussed the fact that this TV series is fiction, even though they tried their best to verify the details by speaking with so many people involved with the story.  

In addition, they used a lot of documentary footage, especially the ambulance scene when the mob attempted to steal the body of Mohammed, and all the rock-throwing demonstrations.  Cedar stated that he wouldn’t know how to make a TV series of substance about Israel that doesn’t reflect reality and have tremendous nuance.  Although it is a close representation of reality, it is a nuanced form of art, and not a form of international propaganda or advocacy.

Our Hero, the Shabak Agent

Simon, the Shabak agent (played by Shlomi Elkabetz) who was tasked with finding the murderers of Mohammed Abu Khdeir, was called a traitor by many right-wing Jews in Israel in the film, and was shockingly misunderstood by his own brother and others within the ultra-orthodox community, especially for his lack of willingness to conduct his life based solely on Jewish loyalty. This character, according to Cedar, was a composite of a few Shabak agents who worked on the case.  Abu-Wael added that the fact that Simon is considered to be traitorous and is forced to leave his job and go abroad makes you want to think about the country we live in. 

The character of the Rabbi

The rabbi in the film, who is also a composite character, is conflicted by the understanding that his son, who committed the murder, actually dragged two of his grandsons into this with him. On the one hand, he wants to empathize with his son, whom he believes is mentally disturbed, and on the other hand, he is somehow bothered fundamentally that his son actually committed murder. He travels all the way to the prison to visit his son, looking for a sign of contrition, willing to apologize to him for how he has treated him over the years.  But he is disappointed in what he finds.  The rabbi represents the kind of Judaism in which young people are growing up and learning to hate “others”, especially Arabs, ultimately leading them to do such disastrous deeds.

The System of Justice

The leading prosecutor (played by Lior Ashkenazi) is also one of the heroes of this film series. He reaches out to the Palestinian father, Hussein, in a very meaningful fashion, and tries to help him as much as possible in preparing for the trial and during the trial itself.

It’s not really a spoiler to tell you the verdict that the judges provide – not to sound banal, they provide justice, the only verdict that was really possible, given the evidence in the case.

And here is the crux of the matter – the judges raise the disturbing question about the kind of Jewish education that these orthodox Jewish boys received. How was it possible that their education led them to such hatred and such despicable deeds? This is undoubtedly one of the major themes of the film, one of the reasons that the actions of these three perpetrators were so disturbing to me and to so many others in Israel and abroad at the time, and still is to this very day.

To see my first posting about this TV series -- press here!

Espionage, Collaborators, and Terrorism

If you are a fan of the thriller, then the Israeli TV series, Fauda, directed by Assaf Bernstein, is for you!  According to the producers of the series, it is based on real-life episodes from their army service as members of an elite unit doing undercover work in the West Bank.  The title of the series means “chaos” and refers to what fighters of the Israeli Secret Service (shin bet) shout into their cellphones when they get into a difficult situation and need back-up.

 

The narrative is about a unit of shin bet counter-terrorism soldiers, hunting down a Palestinian terrorist who is running from one hideout to another, in an attempt to save his own skin and to mastermind another large-scale terrorist attack.  We get to know the fighters on both sides, both Palestinians and Israelis, and their families, their vulnerabilities, and their heroics.  On the Palestinian side, we realize that there are different factions within the terrorist network.  And on the Israeli side, we learn about the tremendous bravery which becomes an obsession as the shin bet undercover agents spend their lives passing as Arabs and penetrating into Palestinian society.

Fauda is a thriller, gritty, hard-hitting, and extremely well-made with complex characters and an authentic script.  I just finished bingeing on the first season – and I was happy to hear that a second season is in the works! You can catch the first season of Fauda on Netflix!

If you like action films, you might want to see Bethlehem by Yuval Adler, previously reviewed on this blog.

Cultural Heroes

Alex in Wonderland, by Ori Sivan, is a creative and thought-provoking documentary portrait of the Israeli photographer and photojournalist, Alex Levac, who was awarded the Israel Prize for photography in 2005.  

 Levac is a remarkable photographer, capturing people on the street who reflect the contemporary Israeli reality.  The film shows his work with contrasts -- enabling the viewer to see things in many diverse and interesting ways.  It also gives us insight into the man -- his curiosity, his bashfulness, and his attraction to the margins of society.  We are treated to photos from his years in Brazil, and a shocking  view of life as seen in an entire series of portraits of people at Tel Aviv's Carmel Market.

Levac became well-known in Israel with his photo of one of the terrorists who hijacked Bus 300, as he was being led away from the bus.  This was an incident in 1984 in which two terrorists who had hijacked an Israeli public bus were executed by Israeli security service personnel (Shin Bet).  The story was later told that they had been killed in the battle to gain control of the bus.  Levac's photograph of the terrorist, however, proved otherwise and caused an uproar in Israeli society.

The film Alex in Wonderland (53 minutes) is available from Ruth Diskin Films and is part of a series entitled Cultural Heroes.  Other films in this series which have previously been reviewed on this blog are:

• ·         Gitai - In search of his Carmel by Ran Tal about the filmmaker, Amos Gitai
• ·         A Stranger in Paris by Nir Bergman about actress and filmmaker, Ronit Elkabetz

Bethlehem by Yuval Adler - New Israeli feature film garners top prizes at Israeli Ophir Awards

The film Bethlehem by Yuval Adler just won six Israeli Ophir Awards including the two most important for best direction and best feature film.  The film was also the big winner at last week's Haifa Film Festival and a prize winner at the Venice Film festival last month (winner in the "Venice Days" section of the festival).  Certainly the best Israeli film of the year!

Adler is a very talented filmmaker.  He spent many years studying art, physics, math and then moved over to philosophy -- many of those years in New York City. Now he has turned his attention to filmmaking and his debut film,  Bethlehem, is a suspense-packed thriller.

The narrative is about a Palestinian teenager named Sanfur, whose older brother, Ibrahim, is the leader of a militant/terrorist/freedom fighting organization.  Sanfur is a collaborator, providing information to the Israelis, and the film is mostly about his intimate and complex relationship with Razi, his Israeli Secret Service (Shin Bet) handler.  

You are probably asking yourself -- is this another Israeli film about the conflict and the evils of the occupation? This is something else entirely, something out of a Nelson De Mille or John Le Carré novel  -- an extraordinary espionage thriller about the intimate and mutually dependent relationship between an informant and his handler.   The script -- by Adler and Ali Waked -- is superbly crafted, offering  great tension and drama, and lending enormous insight into the complexity of the issues surrounding so much of what goes on in the world of spying and counter-terrorism.  There is a wonderful array of characters -- certainly not stereotypes -- realistically portrayed with depth and emotion -- a tribute to both the script and the casting.  The pacing is superb -- never a dull moment.  The locations are realistic and authentic. 

Not portrayed as victims, the Palestinians in this film are seen as complex and varied -- there is the corruption of the leadership of the Palestinian Authority, the back-stabbing between different gangs of militants, and the string of collaborators who are recruited by Israeli Security Service handlers.  The handlers create a fascinating relationship with their informants. I was completely wrong in my assumptions that this relationship would include a lot of verbal abuse, some violence, and extreme exploitation.  As the director explained in a talk with the audience at a local Jerusalem screening last night (at the Lev Smadar cinema), the handler and the informant grow to be mutually dependent and to have a relationship of extreme intimacy.    They talk on their mobile phones very often, are available for each other at all hours of the day and night and we see how both are obsessed with this relationship.

After the screening, people asked questions about Adler's politics.  He refused to answer, stating that the film spoke for itself.  Honestly, the film is not over-the-top in its political perspective.   Rather, it tries to give an authentic glimpse at what was going on (during the years of the Second Intifada) at the level of the street, how individuals were suffering and struggling to get through on a daily basis. 

According to Adler, who I also heard  speak on Israeli radio (as part of the publicity surrounding the opening of the film in Israeli movie theaters), the film portrays a complex reality that is also a cinematic experience.  This is a thriller, an action film, but at the same time, it gives you a glimpse into a world that takes place internationally, the world of spying and intelligence.  He described his research, meeting with Palestinians and Israelis.  Even though the filmmakers strived for authenticity and the film is based on reality to a great extent, Adler admits that "we had to create a balance with the action and dramatic elements."

Bethlehem has already been purchased for distribution in many countries around the world including USA, Japan, and many countries in Europe.  Put this film on your "must" list!  

 Check out the website of the film.  

Two Israeli Documentary Films are Nominated for Oscars

Two films -- both of which appear on my list of "best films of 2012" -- have been nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Film.  

The two films are --

• ·         Five Broken Cameras by Emad Burnat and Guy Davidi, about the Palestinian resistance movement in the village of Bili'in, against the separation barrier which was arbitrarily dividing the people of the village from their agricultural lands.
• ·         The Gatekeepers by Dror Moreh, an exposé of the critical decision-making by the leadership of the Shin Bet, the Israeli security establishment.

The fact that two Israeli films were nominated for an Oscar is incredibly important for the Israeli film industry.  It shows that documentary filmmaking here is on par with that around the world and that our films are not only well-made, but they also tackle important and controversial issues.

There is another reason that it is so important that we have reached this milestone -- this will bring both local and international attention to the subject matter of the films.  Both films deal with how the Israeli military controls the civilian population in the West Bank.  Right-wingers in Israel don't like the term -- but the "occupation" is the word used by most of the Western press and some of the Israeli press to refer to Israeli rule of most of the West Bank for the past 45 years .  While this is a stark reality that has been facing us for a long time, most Israelis live in denial about it and prefer not to know the details. These two films present them in their harsh reality, which must no longer be ignored.

You might be surprised to learn that it is hardly part of the nation's discourse in the upcoming elections.  Most of the "mainstream" Israeli  political parties are not discussing  plans for renewing the peace process, for bringing about "two states for two peoples", or beginning to talk about the need to withdraw from settlements in the West Bank as a compromise on the road to peace.  

The irony is that  the attention that these films will receive in Hollywood may bring these subjects back into the center of public debate within Israeli society.

The Gatekeepers

This week, The Gatekeepers, directed by Dror Moreh and produced by Phillipa Kowarsky, which has been winning attention and accolades internationally, won the U.S. National Society of Film Critics' award for best documentary! 

The film is important for its provocative look at Israel's security or intelligence agency, the Shin Bet, which is charged with keeping us safe by dealing with Israel's war on terror.  All six living former heads of this agency talk candidly on camera about their hard decisions and controversial actions while head of the agency. The six are: Avi Dichter, Avraham Shalom, Yuval Diskin, Jacob Peri, Carmi Gillon, and Ami Ayalon.

The Gatekeepers  which premiered at the Jerusalem Film Festival (July 2012) is feature-length (95 minutes) and is available from Cinephil.

In a review which appeared in The Times of Israel (an on-line Israeli newspaper), David Horovitz wrote:

"For his dark, provocative documentary The Gatekeepers, director Dror Moreh secured interviews with all six living ex-chiefs of the Shin Bet domestic intelligence service. And he achieved that dark, provocative impact neither by sensationalist distortion of their comments nor by camera trickery — although the film includes rare and powerful footage of counter-terror operations. He simply allowed those veteran intelligence chiefs, speaking to camera in separate, intercut interviews, to discuss their roles, the particular challenges that dominated their time in office, and their conclusions about Israel’s fight against Palestinian and, for some of them, Jewish terrorism." (The Times of Israel, July 12, 2012)

See the entire article at The Times of Israel