“Precious Life” screened at the ESRA Cinema Club in Raanana  on 21st February 2011 and reviewed by Sara Groundland.

The audience was totally stunned by it, and the gamut of emotions the film inspired.

I, personally, felt dislike, pity, anger and shame at different stages in the film.  The story of a baby who needed a bone marrow transplant to survive and the extent to which the Channel 10 journalist/director  Shlomi Eldar, and the wonderful doctors and staff at Tel Hashomer went to, to save this little baby’s life was extraordinary.

There are such good people out there, and eventually Raida Mustafa, baby Mohammad’s mother, realized that the indoctrination that had been drummed into her that Israelis are terrible people, was proven false. The fact that the op was paid for by an anonymous Israeli donor who had lost a son in a previous war, and the hair-raising entry from Gaza to Israel at the Erez check-point, the collecting of blood samples to find the right donor and the care and attention that was lavished by Israelis on this family from Gaza, made you hope that in the future there will be a future for both peoples.

This film was short-listed for the Oscars and has, so far, won many prizes in overseas Film Festivals. I only hope the Arab populations will get the chance to see it and come to the same conclusion as Raida,  that we don’t want to be ‘the enemy’.  We just want to live in peace with our neighbours.