Film asks why suicide bombers do it

BERLIN - What makes people carry out suicide attacks?

The question, which the West has wrestled with since the events of September 11, 2001, and the war in Iraq, is one a Palestinian director seeks to answer in a provocative new movie the Israeli film industry has promised to support.

"Paradise Now" follows the fate of Khaled and Said, two young Palestinians in the West Bank city of Nablus who are selected by an unnamed militant group to carry out a suicide bombing in Tel Aviv.

When the plan goes wrong, the friends are forced to decide again whether they really want to go through with an attack. They end up taking very different, and unexpected decisions.

"This story has never been turned into a feature film that ends with someone blowing himself up," director Hany Abu-Assad told reporters after Paradise Now's premiere at the Berlin Film Festival on Monday.

"I wanted to bring a human face to it."

Woven into the deadly plot are moments of black humour, like when Khaled is forced to re-read his lengthy martyr's farewell message when the militants' video camera breaks down.

The characters volunteer for the mission against Israeli soldiers less out of the religious zeal many associate with groups like al Qaeda, which carried out the 2001 attacks on the United States, and more out of frustration at life in Nablus.

A personal element also comes into play, as Said seeks to make amends for the shame brought on his family by his father, executed by militants for collaborating with the Israelis.

"The tragedy of the story is that the father, to give a better life to his children, (has) to collaborate with the enemy," said Abu-Assad. "The son, to make his family's life better, has to kill himself. This is happening."

In an official brochure handed out before the viewing, Abu-Assad said that not a day went by without the crew and actors having to stop filming due to fighting in Nablus.

Six German technicians decided to leave the set when an Israeli missile hit a car nearby, and the team eventually moved to Nazareth after three men were killed in an explosion close to where they had been filming the night before.

"Because the West Bank is under occupation, it has become almost like the Wild West. It certainly felt this way when we were filming!" he said.

The director, whose movie is in the main competition at one of the world's top film festivals, insisted he was not condoning the taking of life.

The female lead tries to dissuade Said and Khaled from carrying out their mission, arguing that it would make them no better than the "enemy".

But Abu-Assad is in no doubt that the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories is an important motivating force.

"For me it's very clear the occupation is the cause to force these people to do it," he said, speaking in English.

"This is a mythical story: to kill yourself (along) with the enemy ... I am re-writing the myth from the human point of view, the Palestinian point of view, from the real point of view."

Despite the potential for controversy, an official from the Israeli Film Fund was quoted as saying in Berlin that his organisation would provide print and advertising support if and when the film found an Israeli distributor.

Its makers doubt it will be seen widely by Israelis, but even limited access would be welcome.

"It is important for Israelis to see such a film. Palestinians are invisible men for them," said Abu-Assad.

As for Palestinians, the problem with seeing the film is less political. It is the almost complete lack of cinemas.

- REUTERS