A few days ago I got sent a link to a 1951 promotional movie about Israel made by Air France. Check it out. http://www.road90.com/watch.php?id=V8B8RekAJJ It is definitely worth seeing. It is really great experience to see all those images of 60 years ago.
The film celebrated a miracle state, but watching it with cynical, 21st century Israeli eyes I couldn’t help notice what was missing. The country at the time was just three years old, had lost fully 1% of its citizens in a brutal war and had already doubled in population due to mass immigration. It was struggling to stay afloat under unimaginable circumstances. There was rationing, and transit camps and simmering political resentments that would take a generation to fully emerge. None of this was apparent from this 30 minute video which hailed the building boom, the successful absorption of the immigrants, a tolerant peaceful society, easy relations with local Arabs, technological advances, the greening of the desert and the draining of the hula.
The Air France film’s job of course was to promote Israel as a tourist destination and nothing in it was untrue. But it wasn’t the whole truth either. Even at the time Israelis would have known there was another side to this picture, and the benefit of hindsight has called into question even further, some of the great Zionist achievements such as draining the Hula.
I compare this movie to the wonderful film that concludes the tour at the Herzl Museum in Jerusalem. (No link here, you will have to visit the museum to see it). In that movie we see 21st century Israel - a beautiful country, technologically advanced, culturally developed and internationally recognized. We see where we came from, and where we have come to. But the Herzl museum doesn’t pretend that everything is perfect. We see poverty, conflict and failing too. As a tour guide I have probably seen this film 50 times or more – and it still stirs me. I still blink back embarrassed tears and feel a welling of pride despite myself. For me the powerful nature of this film lies in the fact that it doesn’t whitewash the truth or pretend everything is great. It acknowledges our failings while reminding us of our very real achievements.
These two movies show the shift in how we approach Israel as educators. Today when we teach about Israel, we no longer speak in the language of myths and heroes, of struggling against overwhelming odds, of Masada never falling again. Today’s educators talk a language of nuance. In 1951 Air France showed a simplistic, perfect place. In 2010 cynical Israelis often see only the failings and the negative. They shy away from Zionist propaganda and overtly national displays. But the modern Jewish educator knows that there is something in between.
We don’t love Israel because it is perfect. We love it because it isn’t. We love it for what it could be, and what we are committed to creating here. We have learned that complexity is not a vice. I see this message in that Herzl movie and that is the message I try to bring to the groups that I teach about Israel.
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