Movie background

Jaden 2021-12-24 08:02:10

1982 was the 7th year of the Lebanese Civil War. This cedar country, originally known as the "Oriental Switzerland" because of its beauty, is now devastated. In the capital city of Beirut, residents died of bullets flying across, bombs exploding, warplanes roaring, tanks crushing, and no one knew what would happen in an instant. However, no one expected that on the night of September 15th, a massacre would come so suddenly.

Lebanon, located on the east coast of the Mediterranean, is the only Arab country that is composed of members of the two major sects of Christianity and Islam, and there are many minor sects in these two major sects, which makes Lebanese society due to its numerous factions and parties. Very complicated. In this small country with an area of ​​10,000 square kilometers and a population of 3 million, sects large and small generally not only have their own political parties, but also have their own armed forces, and even set up their own administration within their sphere of influence. Management agency.

At 16:10 on September 14, the new Lebanese president and key member of the Christian Maronite Beshir Gemayel was killed in the bombing. The Christian Maronites immediately blamed this on the Palestinians, threatening to avenge Gemayel, especially the Lebanese right-wing militia, the Christian Pike Party, which has been following Israel for a long time, even more aggressively. Israel immediately took the opportunity to send troops to occupy Beirut's western area. Israeli Prime Minister Begin explained to the outside world: “This operation is to protect Palestinian Muslims from reprisals by the Phalangists.”

During the occupation of Beirut’s Western District, the Israeli army encountered sporadic resistance from the PLO guerrillas, which caused the Israeli army to some extent. Some personnel and equipment were lost. Sharon, the then Minister of Defense of Israel, immediately issued an order to the frontline commander of the Northern Israeli Military Region Drewry: to immediately take "dramatic measures" to "purify" the Palestinian refugee camps. Drewry immediately commanded the Israeli army to surround the two refugee camps of Sabra and Shatila, and adopted a "sealed isolation" against them, that is, completely cut off all the connections between the two refugee camps and the outside world.

Everyone understands that such "purification" is bound to be carried out during the killing. Considering that there are no resistance forces in the refugee camps, Israel decided to use the hands of the Christian Phalange Party to complete this action, which will be bloody. On the afternoon of the 15th, Drewry convened the Phalanist chief of staff and intelligence chief Hobeka and others at the Israeli military headquarters in Beirut to discuss the deployment of "purification" operations in the two refugee camps. After the meeting, Drewry reported to Sharon: "Our friends are heading towards the refugee camp. We cooperated with their leaders in this action." Sharon praised with satisfaction: "Congratulations, friends The action has been passed.”

Then, in accordance with the negotiated deployment and Drewry’s order, the two refugee camps of Sabura and Shatila were bombarded with intensive military fire. In an instant, there was flesh and blood in the refugee camps. Flying horizontally, the buildings were basically razed, especially many walls were blown down. After the bombardment, people can vaguely see Israeli soldiers on the roof of the nearby Beirut International Airport building and another tall building using binoculars to observe the dynamics of the refugee camp. Everything seemed to be calm again. In fact, this shelling was to remove possible obstacles for the "purification" operation. On the afternoon of the 16th, military vehicles loaded with Phalangist militias drove into the international airport. At 17:00, about 1,200 heavily armed Phalangists assembled on a golf course near the airport, and then rushed to the attack location, the crossroad where the Kuwaiti Embassy was located, along the pre-set road signs.

In the evening, the sky was getting darker. At about 18:00, the roar of helicopters from far to near, and after a while, a few US-made Israeli helicopters flew over the refugee camp, throwing a series of flares. The Israeli army surrounding the refugee camp also turned on searchlights towards the refugee camp from different directions, and the refugee camp was like daylight. At the same time, a large number of Phalange militiamen jumped over the collapsed wall with guns and rushed into the refugee camp. Suddenly, gunfire broke out in the refugee camp, and shouts were endless. Sensitive journalists rushed to the two refugee camps, but were stopped by Israeli troops from a distance. The Israeli military claimed: This is the Phalangists searching for about 2,000 terrorists hidden in refugee camps.

In the next 40 hours, everything that happened in the refugee camp was very terrifying. Later, people learned about the bloody scenes that occurred at the time through the memories of survivors and the self-reports of the executioners:
Several Phalange militiamen rushed into a civilian house where a family of three lived. The militiamen scolded the young couple and young children for standing by the wall, and then slammed the husband on the head with the butt of the rifle. The husband's brain splashed on the wall and died immediately. The child cried and hugged his mother. One militiaman stepped forward and grabbed the mother. Several other militiamen took the child and pressed him to the ground, pressing the muzzle on his head and shooting. The mother went mad and rushed to the militia. A militia bullet hit the mother's heart. After looting inside the house, these militiamen used explosives to blow up the house, and they walked to another house.
A young Palestinian man was tied up, looking at a group of militiamen who were making fun of him in horror. A militiaman first stripped off the young man's clothes and pierced the young man's lower body with a dagger. The youth screamed loudly, blood splattered, and curled up in pain. The laughing militia kept torturing the young man. Finally, a militiaman shot and killed the young man.
The militia surrounded the Akha Hospital on the south side of the Shatila refugee camp. In order to save the hospital from disaster, the four doctors in white coats were entrusted by the dean to hold up white cloths and approached the militia, intending to negotiate with them. However, what greeted the doctor was a grenade. Three doctors were killed on the spot, and one doctor who was seriously injured stumbled back to the hospital. In a blink of an eye, the militia rushed into the hospital, followed by beatings, burnings, and adultery. It was late at night, and this group of militiamen were also tired. They ate supper while admiring the painful moan of the victim before his death.

The massacre lasted all night, and some survivors recalled: “On the night of the 16th, this place was simply a hell. The sky did not darken, the gunfire never stopped, and people kept screaming.” At that time, many Palestinians ran. Out of the refugee camp, crying to the Israeli soldiers for help. However, these soldiers not only ignored them, but drove them back to the refugee camps. After the incident, an Israeli soldier also admitted: "The massacre happened under our noses." And another Israeli soldier later defended when people criticized: "We Israelis didn't do anything like that. The Christian militia did it."

On the 17th, daybreak, the large-scale massacre came to an end. The ruins of the refugee camp are full of dead bodies, many of which are fragmented. The tragic conditions even make the militiamen feel sick and shivered. Hobeka, who was in charge of the massacre at the international airport, immediately issued an instruction: "Clean up the scene immediately without leaving any traces." After a

while, several excavators and bulldozers drove into the refugee camp. Although there were cries for help from time to time in the rubble, the bulldozer still savagely crushed it from above. The excavator dug a large pit several meters deep, the truck dumped the dead body into the pit, and finally the bulldozer bulldozer filled the pit. It wasn't until 10:30 am on the 18th that a group of Israeli soldiers entered the refugee camp, and the Phalanx militiamen assembled in a group, and left the camp with a smile.

After the incident, people found more than 2,300 bodies of Palestinian men, women and children with incomplete limbs in the refugee camp. In addition, 21 Iranians, 7 Syrians, 3 Pakistanis and 2 Algerians were killed. They were all supporters of the PLO.

After the militia evacuated, the Israeli army entered the refugee camp. An Israeli army officer stood on an armored vehicle and repeatedly shouted with a loudspeaker: "Don’t go to the streets! We are searching for terrorists, otherwise, we will shoot." Following the Israeli army was a batch of news from all over the world. Reporter, the shocking scenes in the two refugee camps shocked them, and then the whole world was shocked.

The American journalist Fix was the first group to enter the Chatila refugee camp. His reports and emotions shocked the world. He wrote: “There are corpses everywhere, on roads, in alleys, in courtyards, in broken houses, under rubble, on garbage dumps. In some places, the blood on the ground has not yet dried. When we counted 100 corpses, We will not continue counting.... Every alley is full of corpses, men and women, old and young, either killed by the knife, or killed by a bomb. It's horrible.... Under (a) low wall, A row of young men and boys fell in a pool of blood. They stood facing the wall, shot in the back, and fell under the root of the wall. The scene was very sad and terrifying. This execution wall and the piles of corpses in front of the wall make people familiar with each other. Later we I just remembered how similar it was to the murderous photos shown in World War II news pictures."

In his reports, all showed sympathy and compassion for the victims. He described a scene: "A young girl was lying on the ground. She was facing the sky, as if she was basking in the sun. The blood was dripping from her back, soaking her clothes. She had her feet together and her hands spread out like in the last moment of life met his savior. her face was calm, two Weibi, it looks almost like Notre Dame. only a small bullet hole and blood in the courtyard of her chest that she was dead. "

in In the days that followed, condemnation from all over the world continued one after another, and the Israeli government only passively defended: We thought that the Phalange militias were only searching for PLO guerrillas, but we did not expect them to be so indiscriminate. On September 24, the United Nations held its seventh special emergency meeting. The topic of the meeting was "condemning Israel's crime of massacring civilians in Beirut." After hearing the report, the meeting unanimously requested the UN Security Council to investigate the Beirut massacre.

The massacre also shocked Israeli society. On September 25, a large-scale demonstration involving 400,000 people took place in the capital Tel Aviv, while the total population of Israel at that time was only 4 million. This is the largest demonstration in Israeli history so far. American Jewish historian H? Sackel wrote in 1996: "There has never been such a fierce public outrage in the history of Israel." On February 10, 1983, the Israeli cabinet, which was troubled internally and externally, held an emergency meeting. At the meeting, with the exception of Sharon, the report of the Israeli authorities' committee to investigate the massacre in Beirut refugee camps was unanimously adopted.
On the 11th, the media in many countries reported the news in a prominent position: Sharon was forced to resign.

View more about Waltz with Bashir reviews

Extended Reading
  • Sammy 2022-03-26 09:01:08

    Selective amnesia of an Israeli soldier. Thick lines remind of GTA.

  • Kelvin 2022-03-26 09:01:08

    [A] The incident was based on the 1982 massacre in the Palestinian refugee camps in Beirut, Beirut, Sabala and Shatila, but animation was chosen as the medium of expression, and a lot of personal dream memories were added to the incident record, as well as various The surreal-like art passages (the mad dog chase and the machine gun waltz at the beginning) blur the boundaries between reality and magic in an almost perfect audio-visual experience. The live-action scene at the end actually aggravated this suffocating atmosphere. I don’t know if this is a real hell on earth, or just a nightmare that doesn’t want to go away.

Waltz with Bashir quotes

  • Boaz Rein-Buskila: Do you ever have flashbacks from Lebanon?

    Ari Folman: No. No, not really.

  • Anonymous soldier: What to do? What to do? Why don't you tell us what to do?

    Ari Folman: Shoot!

    Anonymous soldier: On who?

    Ari Folman: How should I know on who? Just shoot!

    Anonymous soldier: Isn't it better to pray?

    Ari Folman: Pray and shoot!