Cinema Politica screening - A FIDAI
| When: | Th 11-09-2025 19:00 - 21:30 |
| Where: | Marie Loke Room, Harmonie Building, Oude Kijk in 't Jatstraat 26, Groningen |
About the documentary
In the summer of 1982 the Israeli army invaded Beirut. During this time it raided the Palestinian Research Center and looted its entire archive.
By revitalizing these lost images through a vibrant editing process, they unleash the subversive power of a counter-narrative that has been erased over the decades, portraying life in Palestine before and after 1948 – particularly during the British mandate of the 1920s-1930s, when the tangible signs of future spoliation, humiliation and violence were already apparent. The Palestinian filmmaker thus meditates with a unique space-time depth of field on the fate of images produced by a people doubly dispossessed, both of its land, and of its history.
About the after-talk and the visual archives of UNRWA
“The UNRWA photo archive: visual voyages of Palestinian refugees”
One of the oldest and largest United Nations' agencies, UNRWA, holds a voluminous audio-visual archive depicting the Palestinian refugee plight as one of the longest lasting cases of forced migration in modern history. Used and contested as visual proof of the Palestinians' historic presence, forced displacement, and modern occupation, this unique photographic record of a people without a nation state in the midst of an on-going conflict, functions as a cultural product of and in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. As UNRWA’s activities are inextricably entangled with the highly political reality in Israel-Palestine, UNRWA has struggled to fulfill its duties of archive practices as the custodian of this particular audio-visual archive. Moreover, the relationship between neutrality and the photographic medium complexifies the production of humanitarian audio-visual material.
About the speakers
Lucia Admiraal is an Assistant Professor of Middle Eastern studies (RUG) and a journalist and Middle East correspondent for NRC Handelsblad, one of the Netherlands’ leading newspapers. Based in the region, she covers political, social, and cultural developments with a focus on Israel/Palestine, Lebanon, and broader geopolitical dynamics. Her reporting often explores the impact of conflict and displacement, media narratives, and civil society in the Middle East. She contributes both written analysis and in-depth podcast journalism.
Lucia holds a background in Middle Eastern studies. Her recent work has examined the use of starvation as a weapon in Gaza and the fragile nature of ceasefires in protracted conflicts.
Michelle Hamers is a photo historian and United Nations employee. After starting as an archive staff member with UNRWA in 2014, she obtained her doctorate in visual culture with a study into the social and political role of the UNRWA audio-visual archive in the ongoing conflict. Michelle has worked for over 11 years in the humanitarian field and is currently with UNHCR.
Karène Sanchez-Summerer is Professor and Chair of Middle Eastern Studies. She is a historian of the Modern Middle East whose research and teaching focus on Christian Arab communities in and from the region. Karène’s work engages with the relational cultural and social history of Ottoman and Mandate Palestine, as well as with the experiences of minorities within and in diaspora from the Middle East. She is particularly interested in exploring multilateral and transnational connections—areas that remain understudied in comparison to dominant national historiographies and conventional periodisations.