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154 chapter seven The Day After The Sexual Economy of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict ■ But every mythology begins with creeping things that emerge from the ground and devour one another, until a holy marriage mends the rent in the universe. Aharon Shabtai, “Lotem Abd al Shafi” (a poem translated by Vivian Eden) The Jewish Victim The framing of many of the stories of forbidden love in the Israeli genre is based on legends or famous themes and tales borrowed from Greek mythology . The use of the Romeo and Juliet story is most evident inHamsin andThe Lover. The murder scene ofHamsin uses the mythological bull (the Minotaur of Greek mythology) to signify the cathartic release of libidinal energies. The Keis and Laila legend, which according to some scholars is the origin of the Romeo and Juliet story, is the inspiration for On a Narrow Bridge. The Andromeda legend constitutes the organizing principle of Crossfire,1 the legend of Pygmalion and Galatea is assimilated intoFictitious Marriage,2 and the saving of the damsel in distress by the prince/knight is the dominant motif in Hannah Gonen’s fantasies in My Michael. This type of framing displaces the patterns of relationships portrayed in these films from reality to the world of legend and mythology.3 Theuseofmythologicalandlegendaryframingforthesefilmsdictatestheir tragic endings as well as their dialectics of sacrifice. In most cases the actual or implied victim is a Jewish character. In Hamsin, despite the barbaric murder of Khaled, Gedalia, the movie implies, is no less a sacrifice on the altar of the conflict. It is Gedalia who suffers from Hava’s choice of Khaled, which he perceives as an absolute violation of the natural order (although the other two forbidden loves suggested by the triangle, between Gedalia and Khaled or be- The Day After 155 tween brother and sister, are even more transgressive). The barbaric murder, disguised as accident, is presented through Gedalia’s point of view, hence internalizing the intense emotionalism of this dramatic scene and suppressing the release of the spectator’s anger at the “liberal” Jewish protagonist. InOn a Narrow Bridge, although Laila is sent into exile by her brother, who tries to save her life, the film, as I previously showed, presents Taggar as the ultimate victim, a sacrifice of the schizophrenic Oriental self. In My Michael Hannah’s fantasies about her Arab princes are one sided. She plays with her obedient princes, but eventually they rebel against her domination and return to take revenge as all the repressed do. Hannah becomes a victim of her own fantasies. She loses her sanity and experiences an emotional death. Hannah thus becomes another victim of the Orientalist fantasy. In Crossfire Miriam is also represented as a sacrifice in the drama of the conflict. The one exception to the Jewish monopoly on victimhood in these films is The Lover. The Palestinian protagonist inThe Lover is not punished by death; yet, like many heroes in Greek mythology, he is sent into exile, paradoxically in his home village. The positioning of the Jew in these narratives in the traditional role of the victim raises some questions. From the 1980s on the authentic representation of Palestinian actors became a norm in Israeli cinema. Yet, this progress in terms of casting did not drastically change the authentic representation of the Palestinian point of view in Israeli cinema, what Shohat calls the politics of focalization . In most of the films made in the 1980s, as Shohat observes, the Israeli leftist point of view mediated the Palestinian one.4 My Michael leaves no opening for a Palestinian perspective. Hannah’s fantasy is one-sided, and the Palestinian twins are devoid of any voice. The Palestinian stonemasons in the film are repeatedly conjured on the film’s screen, as well as in Hannah’s memory , joined by Oriental music on the soundtrack. These characters, always positioned in a pastoral, rural, holy land–type landscape, remind Hannah of “her” twins and are the object of her desiring, longing, and nostalgic gaze. The Palestinians remain in the realm of fantasy as a repressed and disavowed memory of past existence. Hide and Seek does not represent the Palestinian point of view either. The relationship between the Jewish and the Palestinian youngsterstakesplacebehindandbeyondthespectator’sgaze.Throughoutthe film the spectator is subjected to either Uri’s or Balaban’s point of view. The Palestinian youth has no distinct identity. He has neither name nor voice and certainly no point...

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