Narratives of Armed Conflict and Terrorism in the Theatre: Tragedy and History in Hanoch Levin's Murder

. . . a storm is blowing from Paradise; it has got caught in his wings with such violence that the angel can no longer close them.

—Walter Benjamin ²

The play Murder by the Israeli playwright Hanoch Levin, which premiered at the Cameri Theatre, the Tel Aviv municipal theatre, in the fall of 1997, is unique in confronting the extremely complex conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians. Levin's text—as well as the performance based on it—directed by Omri Nitzan, the artistic director of the Cameri Theatre, are a compelling theatrical representation of the chain of violence and counter-violence, of terror, revenge and retaliation that is still feeding this now more than century-old Middle Eastern conflict. Examining this play and some details from the performance, as well as situating it within Levin's oeuvre as a playwright, I want to raise a number of issues about the possibilities of the theatre to reflect and comment on violence and terror, and perhaps even bring about a change of attitudes towards such phenomena within the Israeli political and ideological contexts. I want to stress from the outset that I will examine an Israeli play from an Israeli perspective, and, at the same time, I am aware that there is another side as well. The broader issue I want to raise here, however, is how acts of terrorism and armed conflict shape the narratives performed on the theatrical stages in Israel. Is it at all possible to portray such acts of violence within an aesthetic framework? And how do these kinds of narratives affect our experiences of the grim realities around us; do they have any likelihood of influencing the political realities surrounding us? ³

The Oslo accords, signed between Yassir Arafat and Yitzchak Rabin in 1993 aimed at putting an end to the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza strip conquered in the 1967 war, and laid the groundwork for the gradual establishment of an independent Palestinian state in these territories alongside the state of Israel. At that time, the Israelis and the Palestinians seemed to have entered a path that could have lead to a peaceful solution of the conflict. But since 1997—when Murder was first produced, two years after the murder of Rabin (in November 1995), during Benjamin Netanyahu's term of office as the Israeli prime minister, but in particular after the talks between Arafat and Ehud Barak at Camp David broke down igniting what was to be become known as the Al Aksa Intifada and leading directly to the election of Ariel Sharon for prime minister—this conflict has steadily been accelerating towards its present violent impasse. There have been many very dramatic turning points during this last decade, where optimism has been suddenly and unexpectedly reversed into moods of despair and hopelessness.

When Murder was first performed the initial hopes for a peaceful solution had been seriously shattered, but the crisis had not reached its present destructive dimensions. Looking back on this performance from a five-year perspective, in 2002—when the circles of violence fed by terrorism from both sides have so radically invaded the daily lives of the two peoples and will most probably continue to do so in an unforeseeable future—this performance, and in particular Levin's text, must be viewed as a cynically fulfilled prophesy. Presenting the grim realities of violence and terrorism on the stage in the way Levin has done can even be perceived as an acceptance of these realities, as a kind of coalition of despair with them. However, I believe this was not the intention of Levin and Nitzan. Rather, they wanted to show us how detrimental the circle of violence is by creating a performance that can perhaps change our perceptions and perhaps even, through a growing awareness of their destructiveness, make...