One Day in Hebron

For AJ+ Senior Presenter Dena Takruri, arriving in the Palestinian city of Hebron was a vexing homecoming knowing she wouldn’t find there the lively city her father had known in his youth before leaving for the United States. Takruri nevertheless hoped such a contrast—between her father’s reminisces and the stark images of an Israeli settler-occupied urban center—would bring into focus the lasting effects this encroaching military occupation has on those who left and on those who stayed behind. Capturing her own team’s clash with armed officers and with neighbors intent on making Palestinian residents and visitors alike feel unwelcome (if not outright unsafe), One Day in Hebron offers an unvarnished look at what it means to live cloistered within militarized streets that circumscribe the lives of those within its walled borders. With heartbreaking testimonials by a young girl who’s never known a life without such strictures and featuring Takruri’s father’s teary reactions via video call to the city he once knew and loved, this AJ+ video diary bears witness to the human toll of religious nationalism. For accurately chronicling the day-to-day, if assiduous, discrimination local Palestinians endure in their own city at the hands of Israeli settlers and for weaving Takruri’s own family history into a pressing and increasingly urgent news piece, One Day in Hebron earns a Peabody.