ABOUT THE FILM

In January 2009, while Israel is bombarding Gaza, Rashid Masharawi is in Baghdad making a film on young children forced to work in post-war Iraq. Contrasting their lives with those of similarly burdened Gazan children, the film presents a world in which everyone, no matter how young, has to struggle to survive. As a Palestinian and Gazan, with extensive personal experience of life in refugee camps, Masharawi's deep sense of identification with the children's traumas makes for a deeply affecting and authoritative document of local situation.

DOAN | Filmmakers 2

Rashid Masharawi

Rashid Masharawi was born and raised in Shati refugee camp, Gaza Strip. He is a self-taught filmmaker, beginning to work at eighteen in the cinema industry and acquiring skills on over twenty films before starting himself to write and direct his own. Masharawi’s films portray his knowledge of living under the Israeli Occupation in refugee camps, the new space of the intifada, as well as his constant reflection on cinema narrative.

Rashid Masharawi -- Documentary, 52’, Arabic (Qatar/Tunisia: 2009)