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For a whole week Eyal Sivan has been in the headlines on news pages, op-ed pages, and the internet — a week in which expressions such as the following have appeared next to his name: “prominent hater of Israel,” “sick phenomenon,” “Israeli expatriate who serves as a propaganda machine for the liquidation of the Zionist enterprise.” A whole week in which Sivan has remained silent. Last Wednesday an item appeared in the press stating that Sivan had been chosen to direct a film called “Jaffa” as part of a combined project of Channel 8, the Rabinovitch Foundation, and the Jerusalem Cinematheque. Instead of discussing the film itself, the item pointed its arrows at Sivan, calling him “anti-Israeli,” “pro-Palestinian,” and claiming he “presents Eichmann as a nice person” in his 1999 film “The Specialist.”
Minister Ya’akov Edri called Sivan “anti-Jewish” and demanded that the Minister of Education and the Mayor of Jerusalem use their authority to stop the scandal. MK Yoel Hasson wrote to the press and to Giora Eini, director of the Rabinovitch Foundation: “Sivan holds radical, pro-Palestinian views, has lived in Paris in recent years, and often speaks out against Israel and its policy… Is it possible that he should enjoy public money in the state he loathes so much?” Eini himself commented: “We have had many controversial films, but when I analyze the public outcry that has arisen here, there is no doubt that the discussion is not about the film project but about the director.” In this interview Sivan breaks his silence, confronting the accusations for the first time.
You’ve remained silent for a week. Why have you chosen to respond?
“For exactly the same reason I make films. I don’t create for the readers of Ha’aretz, I believe in the screen and the public and in each person’s ability to look, think, and form his own opinion without guidance from above. This is out of control. We’ve come to a point where you can sell the readers anything. Someone wants the people not to think for themselves, not to question what they read in the paper but just to pass on those rumors. It’s populism.”
Is it personal persecution? Has someone decided to settle accounts with you?
“No, I think there are people who have a hard time with the fact that it’s impossible to put me into the usual boxes. I don’t go around with a terrorist, I’m not eccentric, I have not had contacts with a foreign agent.”
So the campaign has succeeded?
“Yes. Once a person is called an anti-Semite, a Hamasnik, anti-Israeli, it takes root. […] I’ve been convicted in a public kangaroo court without the right of defense, without proof, on the basis of rumors. Without the State Comptroller, without reports, without the law. I’ve been thrown to the dogs, because in a situation where people go around with exposed nerves and existential fear, I’ve become a target. It isn’t just that I mustn’t be given money from a foundation; it isn’t clear why I’m being allowed to breathe.”
This isn’t the first time the 43-year-old Sivan has been at the center of controversy, as in 1987 his film “Aqabat Jaber, Passing Through,” which dealt with the issue of Palestinian refugees, created an uproar. Born in Haifa and raised in Jerusalem, Sivan was active as a young man in a group of students opposing religious coercion and demonstrated with members of “Matzpen” in favor of dialogue with the PLO. In 1985 he went to Paris for a vacation and stayed there for nearly 20 years, making most of his films there, connected to the Middle East and disputed land. French Jewish intellectual Alain Finkielkraut has called him “an anti-Semitic Jew,” and a French court heard the libel suit Sivan brought against him. “It’s true that I lived in France, but I make films that take responsibility for what is happening here. I have only an Israeli passport, even though I could have received French citizenship four times. I am Israeli, and this is what gets everyone so angry.”
Six years ago you found a bullet in your mailbox in Paris. Do you still get worked up by the attacks?
“What surprises me is the permissiveness, the fact that this is accepted as a norm, and that people do not oppose this. […] Forget Eyal Sivan, I’m talking about a dangerous process.”
Why do you annoy so many people? What is there in you that elicits such extreme responses?
“Perhaps I am the child who calls out: ‘The emperor has no clothes!’ Perhaps it’s because I love the people I film, and I present them as human beings. Perhaps it’s because I keep on smiling. It’s annoying.”
So what are you?
“I am in favor of equality between people, and I don’t want to hear about civil equality, that’s separation. People in Sderot are entitled to live with the security that people in Ramat Hasharon have. People in Bet Hanun are also allowed to live as securely as people in Ramat Hasharon… Those who give the order to bomb Bet Hanun and to carry out killings which are followed by missiles falling on Sderot are the people sitting in Ramat Hasharon.”
Sivan’s new cinematic project, to be produced by Arik Bernstein and Osnat Trabelsi, is about the Jaffa brand and its connection to Israel. “This is a film that will combine tons of photographs and posters and archival films,” says Sivan. “There is no one person who has the truth, and this is precisely the argument — there are those who believe that they have the exclusive truth. I have questions.” Though he has made 15 films, this is the first time he has sought Israel Film Foundation support. “It’s absurd: if I don’t approach the Israeli foundations they’ll say that I support the boycott against Israel, if I do approach them they’ll call me a hater of Israel. You can’t win here.”
It is said that you are fond of provocations. What really makes your blood boil?
“Being called an anti-Semite. For me that is a terrible curse, making anti-Semitism banal. Finkielkraut called me a Nazi, and I won’t overlook that because you don’t speak to Nazis, or you fight them and oppose them or kill them. This is part of the world-wide campaign that depicts critics of Israeli policy as anti-Semites. […] Anyone who speaks about equality in Israel is accused of anti-Semitism. It’s a wave that’s become a maelstrom.”
Source : Merav Yudilovitch, “Convicted by a kangaroo court”, Ynetnews, 30 avril 2007.
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Version originale hébraïque (« הרשיעו אותי במשפט שדה », Ynet, 27.04.2007) : lire / télécharger (PDF).