The Narrow Bridge Documentary Screening Confirmed for Migration Festival

Jewish Call for Peace (JCP) asbl has announced that the documentary The Narrow Bridge will be screened at Luxexpo The Box in Luxembourg-Kirchberg on Saturday 24 February 2024 at 16:00, as part of the Festival of Migration (Festival des Migrations).

The Narrow Bridge (2022, 1h16) tells the story of Bushra, Rami, Meytal and Bassam, Israelis and Palestinians who lost a child or a parent in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and who chose to transform their grief into a bridge for reconciliation. The film will be screened with English, Arabic and French subtitles.

The screening, organised by JCP with the support of CLAE and respect.lu, will be followed by an exchange with two characters from the film, Bassam and Rami, as well as a signing session of the book which tells their story and their friendship, Apeirogon (2021), by Irish writer Colum McCann. The exchange will be held in English (with direct oral translation into French).

Bassam Aramin lives in Anata, East Jerusalem and is the father of six children. Bassam began his fight against the Israeli occupation at the age of thirteen. In 1985, at the age of seventeen, he was incarcerated and spent seven years in Israeli prisons between 1985 and 1992. It was in prison that Bassam learned and understood the Jewish narrative that underpins the Israeli state. He later studied history and holds a master's degree in Holocaust studies from the University of Bradford, England. Bassam has been a member of the (Israeli Palestinian) Bereaved Families Forum since 2007, after his ten-year-old daughter Abir was killed by an Israeli border policeman outside her school in Anata on 16 January 2007. As spokesperson for the Parents Circle - Families Forum, Bassam devotes his time and energy to his belief in a peaceful, non-violent end to the Israeli occupation of Palestine and Israeli-Palestinian reconciliation.

Rami Elhanan is a seventh-generation graphic designer from Jerusalem. He identifies as a Jew, an Israeli and, above all, a human being. On the first day of the school year in September 1997, Rami's daughter, Smadar, was killed by two Palestinian suicide bombers who murdered five people that day, including three fourteen-year-old girls. Soon after, Rami joined the Bereaved Families Forum, of which he is an active member and facilitator, speaking to Israeli, Palestinian and international audiences. Rami is convinced that people must be willing to listen to "the other", because listening to the other's story allows one to understand the source of their pain, thus offering the other the opportunity to understand one's own pain. In August 2016, Rami took on the role of co-director of the Parents Circle - Families Forum.

Jewish Call for Peace (JCP) is a small non-profit organisation founded in 2021, aimed at bringing another Jewish voice to Luxembourg on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and to fight against anti-Semitic stereotypes and prejudices, particularly those linked to the Israel-Palestine conflict.