‘The Human Factor’ in Mideast peace
Docu traces the long slog of peace efforts
But there’s a reason “The Human Factor,” by filmmaker Dror Moreh, escapes what would seem a likely fate of being interesting only to policy wonks and those with a direct stake in the issue, and it has something to do with the title. It’s a reference to a line from Dennis Ross, the best-known negotiator of the bunch.
“You can’t ignore the human factor,” he says at the beginning. “Someone who has a human touch treats someone else with respect. Someone who has a human touch doesn’t think they’re going to outsmart anybody.”
The film goes on to prove the point, threading a delicate line between giving us necessary facts and sounding like a dry history lesson. But the value is in the small, and yes, human details -- like the fact that Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat took it upon himself to cut Ross’ chicken for him when they ate together. Or the incongruous sight of Arafat’s entourage watching “The Golden Girls” on TV.
The film is full of such humanizing touches, not just about Arafat but about Israeli leaders and American ones, too. Like Bill Clinton, depicted here as a man on a career-defining mission to achieve a peace deal. One small but stunning anecdote: As the Monica Lewinsky scandal is breaking, casting a cloud over Clinton’s presidency, Ross looks over at his boss’ notepad during a crucial meeting. Clinton is writing: “Focus on your job. Focus on your job.”
The film traces the long slog of peace efforts through archival footage and interviews with key negotiators: Ross, who played a huge role for more than a decade, working for presidents from Reagan to Obama; Martin Indyk, twice the US ambassador to Israel; and negotiators Gamal Helal, Aaron David Miller and Daniel Kurtzer.
Through these men, especially Ross, we get a close-up view of world leaders and how they behaved behind closed doors. There’s a fascinating description of a meal in the small dining room off the Oval Office between Clinton, Arafat, Israeli Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and King Hussein of Jordan. Ross describes an offended Hussein admonishing Netanyahu as if he were a wayward schoolboy: “You don’t have the maturity to be a leader,” he tells him, according to Ross. “You have to grow up and become a leader.” There’s silence in the room.
At another point, Ross describes Clinton exclaiming about Netanyahu: “Who does he think the superpower is?”
This is, of course, after the death of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin at the hands of a Jewish extremist in 1995, as he pursued peace. The film effectively portrays the grudging respect that had slowly formed between Rabin and Arafat, from a moment when shaking hands was a painful gesture to a time when Arafat would casually drape his arm across Rabin’s back.
Recounts
For this viewer, the most “human” factor of the film comes with the shock over Rabin’s death, especially from Ross himself. The negotiator recounts that he’d been taking one of his children home from a doctor’s visit when he was paged by Secretary of State Warren Christopher.
Once the news sunk, Ross’ wife had to explain to their children why Dad was crying. “They’d never seen me cry before,” he says. And, speaking to the camera today, the tears return. “It’s obviously still a moment I really can’t talk about,” he says.
Ross would, of course, stay on the job, trying to broker peace between Arafat and Netanyahu, or Arafat and Prime Minister Ehud Barak. Clinton was determined, but that wasn’t enough. The high-stakes 2000 Camp David summit fails to produce an agreement, and we see Clinton in his last days in office in January 2001, in a call with Arafat, who calls him a “great man.”
“No I’m not,” Ross quotes Clinton as saying. “I’m a failure.”
The film does not, of course, conclusively answer its primary question: What went wrong?
But there’s a hint. It is Miller who raises most directly one of the most serious issues: Was the United
States ever really equipped to be an “honest broker”? Was real peace ever possible when the Americans were essentially, as Miller puts it in retrospect, acting as Israel’s lawyers?
“I don’t think I am free from prejudgments,” he says. And he asks: “Did we have Palestinian lawyers?”
“The Human Factor,” a Sony Pictures Classics release, has been rated PG-13 by the Motion Picture Association of America “for some violence/bloody images.” Running time: 108 minutes. Three stars out of four.
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LONDON: It’s still not time for “No Time to Die.”
Producers of the forthcoming James Bond thriller say the film’s release has been delayed again, until the fall of 2021, because of the effects of the coronavirus pandemic
The official 007 Twitter account said late Thursday that the 25th installment in the franchise will now open on Oct. 8.
“No Time To Die” was originally slated to open in April 2020 but was pushed back to November of that year as the virus swept around the world. It was then delayed again to April 2, 2021.
The film from director Cary Joji Fukunaga stars Daniel Craig as 007, Rami Malek, Lashana Lynch and Ana de Armas.
It’s one of a slew of major releases to be pushed back or moved to streaming services as Hollywood studios grapple with coronavirus-related restrictions that have shuttered cinemas in markets around the world.
While mass-vaccination programs in many countries give hope that theaters can reopen, progress on immunization is slow.
After the latest Bond delay was announced, Sony said it was pushing back several of its scheduled spring releases. It said “Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway” was moving from April to June, “Ghostbusters: Afterlife” was delayed from June to November and “Cinderella,” starring singer will now arrive in July rather than February. (AP)