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Beirut to Bosnia: Muslims and the West Tape 1 - The Martyr's Smile-Parts One, Two and Three Box 329, Video-cassette ME143, Box 346, Video-cassette ME143
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- Producer: A Chameleon/Barraclough Carey. Production for Channer Four and Discovery Channel
- Original Credits: Written and Presented by Robert Fisk. Producer Dennis Walsh. Director Michael Dutfield. Archive: NBC, BBC, INA.
- A personal journey by Robert Fisk of the Independent. The story begins in Beirut Lebanon, tracks the hatred of Muslims for the West. Talks to mothers of martyrs, sons who have died fighting the Israeli army. Fisk travels to Baalbek to look at the influence of the Iranian revolution and Ayatollah Khomeini on the Hezbollah party in Lebanon. Documents a Hezbollah rally, includes the change that the Israeli invasion had on the violence in the regions, many Lebanese dying with weapons supplied by America, including children killed by phosphorus bombs. Also includes reports on the massacres at Sabra and Shatila Palestinian refugee camps. Fisk details his own personal eyewitness encounter of the camps right after the massacre, including photos. Fisk travels to southern Beirut to interview Sayed Hassan Nasrallah, Secretary General of the Hezbollah party. Fisk contrasts the fact that the West concentrates on the several Western hostages taken in kidnappings when over 17,000 Lebanese were kidnapping and many thousands of these were murdered. Interview with Anis Nakash, attempted to assassinate the Shah's prime minister exiled in London in 1980. He discussed the role of the West in the Middle East and the disregard for innocent people in the Middle East. Details the occupation of southern Lebanon by the Israelis and the constant battles between the Israeli government and innocent civilians in this occupied region. Includes footage of Hezbollah fighters attacking an Israeli post. UN field peacekeepers detail Israeli attacks on innocent villages. Fisk talks about notorious Al Khiam prison, which houses Lebanese prisoners, where torture according to Amnesty International is routine. The prison is run by Lebanese Christian proxy fighters for Israel. Part three details the killing of civilians by Israel in retaliation for attacks on their military occupation forces in the occupied part of southern Lebanon. Film also includes footage taken in Lebanese hospitals detailing the injuries on civilians, victims of shelling in southern Lebanon, including children. Film also details the Shi'ite celebration of the martyrdom of Hussein, son of Ali, a celebration often bloody in acted ritual and the connection to the victim consciousness of the Shiites of Lebanon.
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Beirut to Bosnia: Muslims and the West Tape 2 - The Road to Palestine-Parts One, Two and Three Box 329, Video-cassette ME144, Box 346, Video-cassette ME144
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- Producer: A Chameleon/Barraclough Carey. Production for Channer Four and Discovery Channel
- Original Credits: Written and Presented by Robert Fisk. Producer Dennis Walsh. Director Michael Dutfield. Archive: NBC, BBC, INA
- A personal journey by Robert Fisk of the Independent.
- The film documents the exile from Palestine of Muslims by the Israelis both during 1948 and 1967. Palestinians are forced to live in Lebanon, refugees from the creation of Israel in 1948. Palestinians who belong to Hamas who are forced to live in the boundary between Lebanon and Israel. They were exiled from the West Bank and Gaza and created a small Islamic republic in the mountains of southern Lebanon. They feel bitter anger the west and Israel. Fisk interviews Hamas fighters who talk about reasons for fighting. Fisk travels from Beirut to Palestine through Cyprus and then travels to Gaza from Jerusalem to witness first hand the Kafkaesque labyrinth of travelling from Beirut to Palestine in the days before the hand over of Gaza to the Palestinian Authority headed by Yasser Arafat. He describes the desolation of the situation in Gaza. He also films the direct actions of the Israeli army as they occupy and enforce curfews in Gaza. He also documents the destruction of Palestinian homes by the Israelis and the military occupation that is a routine part of daily life in Palestine. In the second part he documents the role of Hamas in aiding the people in Gaza, particularly those who were killed by Hamas for collaborating with the Israelis. Interviews Hamas members in Gaza about whether the struggle is a national struggle or a struggle for God, an Islamic struggle, says it's a war between religions not a war between nations. A Hamas gunman is killed in Gaza and then destroyed all the surrounding Palestinian homes in random violence. Part three continues with a report about a Jewish settlement in the heart of Arab land in Gaza and interviews with Jewish settlers. Continues with the illegal annexation of East Jerusalem by Israel and the huge Jewish settlement cities built on Palestinian land. Documents a Palestinian family who is clinging to their orchard in the shadow of Israeli settlements and orders to give up their land by the Israeli state. Includes footage of bulldozers plowing up the land for settlements right next to the land of the Khatibs, who are attempting to stay on their land. Lawyer details case that the family is trying to make and the reply of the Israelis that the land is to be used by Jews and Jews only, you are not a member of the public that this land is to serve. The next part follows Fisk's journey to Acre where he finds the home of the Palestinian exiled in Lebanon. He goes to the home and finds an Israelis living there who moved in two years after he was forced into exile and was unable to return. Fisk then travels to Poland and the town where this Israeli was originally from and then to the Treblinka concentration camp where his mother was killed.
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Beirut to Bosnia: Muslims and the West Tape 3 - To the Ends of the Earth-Parts One, Two and Three Box 332, Video-cassette ME145, Box 346, Video-cassette ME145
- Abstract Or Scope
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- Producer: A Chameleon/Barraclough Carey. Production for Channer Four and Discovery Channel
- Original Credits: Written and Presented by Robert Fisk. Producer Dennis Walsh. Director Michael Dutfield. Archive: NBC, BBC, INA.
- A personal journey by Robert Fisk of the Independent.
- In this part of the series Fisk starts out in Egypt describing the violence perpetrated against tourists there in the early 1990's. Includes footage of the assassination of President Sadat by Islamic fundamentalists as well as interviews with members of the Gama'a Islamiyya about the attempts to create an Islamic state. Discusses the divide between the rich and poor, as well as the police role in torturing Islamic suspects. Also, details the disastrous effects on the tourist trade in Egypt. Part two has Fisk travelling to Bosnia, where the Islamic faith is under siege by Serbian and Croat forces. He discusses the war's effects on the Bosnia Muslim population and the loss of faith that help from the West will come. Film was made when Sarajevo under siege still by Serb forces. Interviews with Bosnian civilians and UN military personnel about the situation of the bombardment. Includes footage from the hospitals in Sarajevo that document the daily carnage caused by the sniper fire. Interviews with Bosnia Muslim fighters in Sarajevo, as well as some background on the history of Islam in Bosnia. A Muslim cleric comments on the feelings of betrayal the Bosnia Muslims have towards the west. Part three begins with a trip to the North of Bosnia where Fisk describes the Serb offensive as ethnic cleansing and a push to steal the Muslim land. He visits a mosque that he had visited a year before that was not destroyed with the Imam gone missing. Fisk excoriates Western governments for ignoring the problems of Muslims in the Middle East. Ends with Bosnian Muslims being sent into exile, powerful symbolic images of people being put on trains and sent away.
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Part 1: CNN: A Conversation with the President of Iran - Part 2: 60 Minutes: Massacre in Algeria - [1998 Jan. 7] Box 332, Video-cassette ME146
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- Part 1: A special report presentation, interview with Mohammed Khatami, the President of Iran, first interview with a worldwide TV network, interview conducted in Tehran by reporter Christiane Amanpour.
- Part 2: Astounding reports of terrorist massacres in Algeria, reported on by Christiane Amanpour and 60 minutes.
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Iran Bombs Iraq [1993 Jan. 7] Box 332, Video-cassette ME147, Box 346, Video-cassette ME147
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- Producer: Journeyman Pictures
- For centuries Kurdish nomads have freely crossed the mountainous borders which officially split their homeland. Iran is determined to divide up the Kurds and is spending millions on new roads and military bases along its border with Iraq. It wants to quench support among the Iraqi Kurds for the separatist Kurdish Democratic Party of Iran (KDPI). KDPI fighters have based themselves in villages in Northern Iraq in preparation for their campaign in Iran. From their mountain vantage points Kurds watch Iranian shells destroy their homes. Torn apart between four countries, the shelling is a stark reminder of just how vulnerable the Kurdish nation is.
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Turkey - PKK Fighters [1991 Jan.7] Box 329, Video-cassette ME148, Box 345, Video-cassette ME148
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- Producer: Journeyman Pictures
- Kurdish officials in Turkey wonder whether Saddam Hussein will ever sign an agreement for true Kurdish autonomy. The fight for a Kurdish state has been led for over forty years by wealthy landowners. But now a new force has emerged; the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), or Kurdish Workers' Party. This film follows the PKK as they move along the mountainous border between Turkish and Iraqi Kurdistan. The border between Turkey and Iraq has been swept away by the UN-declared safe-haven and the PKK are garnering support from Iraqi Kurds. The PKK teach a Maoist philosophy to their recruits and, uniquely among Middle Eastern people, the women study, live and fight along with the men.
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Iraq - Kurdish Infighting [1996 Jan. 10] Box 329, Video-cassette ME149, Box 345, Video-cassette ME149
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- Producer: Journeyman Pictures
- A story of betrayal and Saddam's revenge remaining deeply pertinent despite ongoing fighting and shifting territories. In a poignant inquiry into the strange wars of Kurdistan, the lush Babylonian mountains of Northern Iraq host again the ancient rivalry which has bedeviled the Kurdish regions. The fighting between the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) was triggered by the former's deal with Saddam. Massoud Barzani, the KDP leader, and architect of the Kurdish deal with Saddam, insists he would not have dealt with the Iraqi leader if the West had agreed to assist the Kurds of Iraq. The aim of the Iraqi National Congress, a Kurdish organisation run closely with the US, is to destabilise Saddam Hussein. At their compound in Erbil Kurds who helped the Iraqi National Congress (INC) still live in fear of Iraqi agents in the town. Hundreds of their compatriots were executed by the Iraqis when the KDP Kurds and the Iraqi troops first took the city. Barzani, the KDP leader, denies that Iraqi agents are still in Kurdistan. In Halabja memories of the gas attack in 1988 are still fresh. The ruins and survivors of those terrible days remind everyone just how bad things could get if Saddam comes back.
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Iraq - Depleted Uranium [1999 Jan. 6] Box 329, Video-cassette ME150, Box 345, Video-cassette ME150
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- Producer: Journeyman Pictures
- The fallout from depleted uranium shells used in the Gulf War is today a political hotcake. What is the reality of depleted uranium (DU) pollution in Iraq and what effects are in store for Kosovans and Serbs? In the hospitals of Basra doctors are speaking of a crime against humanity. Flicking though his casebook from the last four years, Doctor Abdul Karin shows pictures of babies born without skin, with over-sized heads and with noses where a mouth should be. Doctors here firmly point the finger of blame at the Allies' use of Depleted Uranium shells during the Gulf War. Over a million rounds of the weapon were fired during the short and decisive round of bombing. Favoured for its armour piercing qualities, a DU bomb penetrates its target with intense radioactive heat, incinerating its victims. "It's . . . a flash, bang sort of toaster," describes Nuclear Consultant John Range. Once detonated DU particles remain radioactive for 4000 million years. Irradiated particles travel on the wind polluting water and soil and entering the food chain. If the Iraqi doctors here are right, the West is responsible for immense suffering. Jisn Mohamed is in hospital for her third caesarean. She's already borne four deformed babies. "We'll see what they bring out of me . . . I'm very scared, in fact I'm petrified." Lying on her bed after the operation, without painkillers thanks to economic sanctions, the doctors have to tell her that her baby is again deformed and probably won't survive. British investigators into Gulf War syndrome deny that DU could be responsible for the scale of cancers and congenital defects afflicting Iraq. DU in the quantities used in the shells should not, they say present a serious hazard. Tests on British soldiers have produced "no convincing evidence that Uranium represents a hazard to people." So could the reasons for Iraq's health problems lie elsewhere, including Saddam Hussein's own use of chemical weapons? We speak exclusively to former head of Iraqi intelligence Wafiq Samarrai. He claims that Saddam is using the issue of DU as propaganda, to arouse international indignation and force the West to finally abolish economic sanctions. Iraq, he says, was already heavily contaminated before the Allies dropped their DU bombs. Chemical weapons were used against Iran and the Kurds in the North. But with government minders following every move in Iraq it's difficult to get to the truth. Depleted uranium has now been used in the heart of Europe. The same questions about cancer rates and birth defects will soon be being asked in Kosovo. And the true danger represented by depleted uranium is set to become an increasingly controversial topic. Especially if it turns out that the West which has accused Saddam Hussein of amassing weapons of mass destruction, has itself used radioactive and chemically toxic weapons against Iraq.
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Kuwait - An Oily War [1996 Jan. 3] Box 329, Video-cassette ME151, Box 345, Video-cassette ME151
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- Producer: Journeyman Pictures
- Metal towers, topped by roaring flames, rise up out of a flat, gravely desert. This is one of Kuwait's many oil fields. In less than 5 years the black, viscous substance that took Kuwait and the West to war rebuilt Kuwait city. In defence of Kuwait's promise to introduce democratic reform after the war, a member of the ruling Al Sabah family rejects 'Western democracy' but maintains that open debate operates through parliament, the press and private gatherings. In opulent tents and gilded palaces, the ruling elite of Kuwait meet to play cards and to discuss sex, religion and politics. By Arab standards, this offers a model of political freedom. Kuwaitis are a minority in their own country. They live off the menial work of 'guest workers.' Before the war, 400,000 Palestinians were part of this workforce until Yasser Arafat's dealings with Saddam Hussein turned them all into collaborators. Near the Iraqi border, a UN force from Bangladesh, one of the poorest nations, holds fort for one of the richest. All the ceremonial garb and military band playing does little to diminish the threat that Saddam Hussein still poses for this small, oil rich state.
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