Gaza 1956

Rafah, een stad in het meest zuidelijke puntje van de Gazastrook, is, en was altijd al, een beruchte brandhaard in het bittere conflict in het Midden-Oosten. Grote delen van de stad liggen nu in puin, vuil hoopt zich op, jonge kinderen en werkloze mannen bevolken de smalle straten van het naargeestige oord. In 1956 schoten Israëlische soldaten in Rafah 111 Palestijnen dood. Die zwarte dag laat de tegenstrijdige waarheden zien waardoor een hardnekkige oorlog wordt gedefinieerd. Was het een meedogenloze massamoord of een vreselijke vergissing? (bron: Stripweb)

Quinze ans après la publication de son premier livre, Palestine une nation occupée, Joe Sacco retourne dans la bande de Gaza pour enquêter sur un massacre de la population palestinienne par l'armée israélienne en 1956. (bron: Stripweb)

ENGELSTALIG Rafah, a town at the southernmost tip of the Gaza Strip, is a squalid place. Raw concrete buildings front rubbish-strewn alleys. The narrow streets are crowded with young children and unemployed men. Situated on the border with Egypt, swaths of Rafah have been reduced to rubble. Rafah is today and has always been a notorious flashpoint in this most bitter of conflicts. Buried deep in the archives is one bloody incident, in 1956, that left 111 Palestinian refugees dead, shot by Israeli soldiers. Seemingly a footnote to a long history of killing, that day in Rafah - coldblooded massacre or dreadful mistake - reveals the competing truths that have come to define an intractable war. In a quest to get to the heart of what happened, Joe Sacco arrives in Gaza and, immersing himself in daily life, uncovers Rafah, past and present. Spanning fifty years, moving fluidly between one war and the next, alive with the voices of fugitives and schoolchildren, widows and sheikhs, Footnotes in Gaza captures the essence of a tragedy. As in Palestine and Safe Area Goražde, Joe Sacco's unique visual journalism has rendered a contested landscape in brilliant, meticulous detail. Footnotes in Gaza, his most ambitious work to date, transforms a critical conflict of our age into intimate and immediate experience. (bron: Stripweb)

(W/A) Joe Sacco A bloody incident in 1956 left 111 Palestinians dead, shot by Israeli soldiers. To uncover the truth, Joe Sacco immerses himself in daily life of Rafah and the neighboring town of Khan Younis, delving into Gaza past and present. Spanning fifty years, moving fluidly between one war and the next, alive with the voices of fugitives and schoolchildren, widows and sheikhs, Footnotes in Gaza captures the essence of a tragedy. (bron: Stripweb)