POV: The Law in These Parts

Israeli filmmaker Ra’anan Alexandrowicz’s The Law in These Parts examined the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through a new lens — that of the high-ranking military officers who constructed the legal framework for administering Israel’s 40-year occupation and rule. Through intensive interviews with retired military judges, prosecutors, and legal advisors, Alexandrowicz demonstrates how language and semantics are as much occupiers as military personnel and guns, and how the moral implications of such legal renderings may call into question a society’s core democratic values. From the inequality of military courts for Palestinians and civilian courts for Israelis, to the refusal of prisoner-of-war status for Palestinian fighters, to the resurrection of old Ottoman law to justify land seizures, the film repeatedly demonstrates the power of law to construct troubling outcomes. Employing a reflexive documentary style, with the interviewees forced to bear cinematic witness to their legal choices and justifications, the film interrogates the central principle of “reality” that both documentary and the rule of law often take for granted. For its originality, its unflinching focus, and its central concern with humanity, The Law in These Parts receives a Peabody Award.

Executive Producers: Laura Poitras, Simon Kilmurry. Co-Executive Producer: Cynthia Lopez. Producer: Liran Atzmor. Director: Ra’anan Alexandrowicz. Writer: Ra’anan Alexandrowicz. Cinematogrpaher: Shark De Mayo. Editor: Neta Dvorkis.