‘We Israelis tell ourselves a sugar-coated story that we did no wrong’

EETTA PRINCE-GIBSON talks to ALON SCHWARZ about his explosive documentary Tantura, about the alleged massacre of Palestinians in 1948, which has provoked debate across the political divide.

Alon Schwarz says his film Tantura is not really about Tantura, the Palestinian seaside village where dozens, and some reports say, hundreds, of Palestinians were murdered in what may have been one of most horrific events of Israel's 1948 War of Independence.

In an extensive interview with The Jewish Independent, Schwarz, 51, the producer and director of the controversial documentary, is articulate, demanding and at times argumentative. "Tantura is not 'merely' about the events that happened there. It's not a [strictly] historical account, although I bring new historical facts,” he says. 

“Tantura is a portrait of Israeli society and the way in which Israel has silenced the facts of the Naqba," he says, referring to the Arabic word for “catastrophe”, used by Palestinians to describe the events of 1948.

"We Israelis tell ourselves a sugar-coated story that we did no wrong," he continues.  "We live in a fantasy world, and we must learn the whole truth.  There was ethnic cleansing, and there were massacres. The Israeli public doesn’t know – or doesn’t want to know.  I didn’t know, either, until I made the movie."

Acknowledging this history, he says, is part of his Zionism, and Tantura is an expression of his "commitment to Israel and the Jewish people".

The village of Tantura was located on the southern Carmel shore on the Mediterranean Sea. The village, with a population of some 1500 residents, was conquered by the Alexandroni Brigade's 33^rd battalion on the night of May 22, 1948.  

In March 1998, Teddy (Theodore) Katz, then in his mid-50s, completed an MA thesis in the department of Middle Eastern History at Haifa University titled “The Exodus of the Arabs from the Villages at the Foot of Southern Mount Carmel in 1948.” His research, based on in-depth interviews and archival documents, led Katz to the conclusion that Israeli soldiers had massacred men, and some women, after the village had been conquered. The thesis received a grade of 97 out of 100, and Katz hoped to pursue a PhD.     

In 2000, a journalist wrote a story in a daily newspaper, based on Katz's research, that was headlined “The Tantura Massacre.”  Outraged, the Alexandroni Brigade Veterans' Association and other former soldiers filed a libel suit against Katz and Haifa University. Katz, who suffered an aneurysm during the proceedings, settled out of court and renounced his own findings.

Two years after approving the thesis, a university committee reexamined the thesis and disqualified it. Katz was discredited and became known as the man who libelled heroic soldiers of Israel's War of Independence. The Israeli public was reassured that nothing untoward had happened at Tantura.

Until, that is, Schwarz took an interest in the story and gained access interviews with the former soldiers of the Alexandroni Brigade and Palestinian witnesses - and began to investigate further.

Schwarz is an unlikely documentary filmmaker. Born in Rehovot and now living in Herzliya, he worked in high-tech and as an entrepreneur for about 16 years. He also studied law. But at some point, he says: "I realised I wasn't making any change in the world, and a person has to find some meaning in life. And since childhood, I had wanted to make movies.  So, I decided to go for it."

He has made two films, both on sensitive and difficult topics. The first was Aida's Secrets (2016), an investigation into the family history of two brothers born in a displaced persons camp after World War II who were separated and never told about each other. It was both a critical and financial success and, like Tantura, Schwarz says, also "involved old people revealing secrets and was a huge research project".

Although he had no record of political involvement, for his second documentary, Schwarz had intended to make a movie about Israeli NGOs. The film wasn’t made but during research for it, he became aware of the story of Tantura and Teddy Katz. "Katz was pleased that someone was taking an interest and was happy to share his information with me," Schwarz recalls.

He worked on Tantura for several years, and, in addition to Katz's materials, filmed dozens of interviews with soldiers from the Alexandroni Brigade. Unlike their denials at the libel trial, these soldiers opened up to Schwarz's camera and talked about atrocities.

"These men are old now, and I think they wanted to share a deep truth that has been inside their souls. Or, because of their age, they just didn't see any reason to lie anymore," he says.

In the documentary, Schwarz cites Israeli Army documents that do not specifically mention a massacre but do refer to irregularities and "acts of destruction". He also provides aerial photography from April 1948 and October 1949, seen by the public for the first time in the film, that show the appearance of a 35-metre trench dug in the place where survivors and witnesses said the bodies had been buried.  The implied assumption is the mass grave had been moved to remove the evidence.

In addition, he interviewed historians and residents of kibbutzim in the region who forcefully insisted that no such massacre happened.

Schwarz says he does not judge the soldiers. "All of Israel was afraid of annihilation. It was only three years after Jews had been led to the gas chambers. During World War II, [Arab nationalist leader] Amin al Husseini had been plotting with the Nazis. It is wrong to judge events today according to the standards and conditions then."

Schwarz has no doubt that a massacre occurred at Tantura, and yet he says, " I don’t think there is one truth – certainly not with regard to the numbers. This is a documentary film, not a news report. It’s about Tantura, of course, but at its base, it is a movie about Israeli society and about all societies that deny their past – including the United States, Canada, and Australia, among others."

The film premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival in the World Cinema Documentary Competition, where it was well received, then at other international film festivals. In Israel, it was screened at the Doc-Aviv festival; the screening itself was controversial, and the controversy has continued.

"Some Israeli historians have criticised me because they are afraid of being found out," he says bitterly. "They were part of the effort to erase the Naqba and create Israeli myths. The soldiers themselves provide the information, but these historians argue about the tiniest details and pounce on the smallest discrepancies as if they prove that nothing happened.

"I am not an expert on the Holocaust or Holocaust denial," he says, "but these people remind me about the deniers who make a big deal about some nut or bolt on the door of the gas chambers, as if it proves that there were no gas chambers and no Holocaust. It makes me want to vomit."

The Jewish Left, and especially the far- and anti-Zionist Jewish Left, he continues, doesn't know how to deal with complex reality. "We must simultaneously tell the truth of what happened, and still accept the validity of the Jewish State. But the Left isn't brave enough to do that, so they criticise me instead,” Schwarz says angrily.

"I made a movie about silencing, and they are still trying to silence me and the entire topic subject of Naqba. But I am not surprised."

Yet despite the criticism from "all sides," he says that he is proud to note that he has received funding from mainstream Israeli sources.

Some Palestinians have also attacked his work because, he says, "I don't exaggerate and invent terrible things, like they do. What happened was bad enough. They are angry at me because I am a Zionist, and I believe that Israel has the right to exist.

“But the Jewish State cannot exist from the ‘River to the Sea’, just as the Palestinian State cannot exist from the ‘River to the Sea’. We must all compromise.

"I am not surprised by Palestinians' criticisms because Palestinian resistance and denial has played a major part in the perpetuation of the conflict. Their unrealistic insistence on the Right of Return will keep us from ever reaching any agreement. But I was taught that first we must take responsibility for ourselves. 

"We have to look in the mirror and understand that we are a people like any other people. There were horrific incidents when other nations were established, and the ethnic cleansing here wasn’t big in the macro picture, but it was ethnic cleansing. We need to understand that our grandparents did great things and established the state, but we must also understand our grandparents’ wrongdoings. It was all part of the complex reality of state building.

"Does this mean we are Nazis? Of course not.  Are we worse than the Russians? Of course not.  Or the Chinese or others?  No, we are not.  There are many armies that have done much worse than we have, including the Americans.”

But by denying the Naqba, he insists, Israeli society has been lying to itself and denying the Palestinians their memories. "We must reach out to the Palestinians and say we are sorry for what we did wrong. I don't know how Palestinians will respond. I don't know if this will help put an end to the conflict. But I know that this is what we must do."

Schwarz insists Tantura is about Israeli society and is proud that his work has been so well received abroad. Yet he knows that there are those who will use the film to say that the State of Israel was born in sin.

"Yes, there will be many people in other countries who distort what I say and do, just like there are in Israel. Those critics and the boycotters don't need Alon Schwarz or my movie to hate Israel. But it's important to show this movie abroad to show that Israel is maturing. Naqba has become an important topic in Israeli society - among documentary filmmakers, in public discussion.

“Even public television is doing a series on Israel's past. Our broadcasters are very brave and, slowly, despite all the critics, our society is slowly beginning to confront its past. That is courageous, and mature and bold."

Despite his commitment and success, at times he feels, "emotionally broken by all the controversy. I don’t want to deal with Naqba or the Palestinian-Israeli conflict anymore. My next movie will have nothing to do with this – if I even do another movie."

Tantura will be screened at the Antenna and JIFF film festivals this month. Alon Schwarz will visit Australia and will be in conversation with The Jewish Independent journalists at the following sessions:

Antenna Film Festival

Sunday, October 16, at 2pm, Ritz Cinemas, Randwick. Alon Schwarz will be in conversation after the screening with Michael Visontay, The Jewish Independent Commissioning Editor  

Jewish International Film Festival

Wednesday, October 26, at 6:30pm, Classic Cinemas, Elsternwick. Alon Schwarz will be in conversation after the screening with Deborah Stone, Editor-in-Chief of The Jewish Independent

Photo: June 13, 1948: The expulsion of Tantura women, children and elderly from Fureidis to Jordan (Beno Rothenberg collection, courtesy of the Israel State Archives)