(2008; Sof Shavua B'Tel Aviv, Hebrew) On Friday morning a young Palestinian man from the West Bank, Tarek Rana (Shredi Jabarin), is given a bomb vest while being driven into Tel Aviv by his two Arab handlers, Abed and Salim (unlike Abed distrusts Tarek's motives), who tell Tarek: "You're our air force." Following final instructions to make his way into the crowded Carmel Market, he's reminded that if he fails to press the button to detonate himself, they can remotely set off the explosives.

An electrical repair shop owned by Katz (Shlomo Vishinsky), an elderly man mad at the world, sits across the alley from a kiosk run by 17-year-old Keren (Hili Yalon), who has left her religious family to be on her own. Opening the hydrants because "There's too much water in the country," Katz mourns his dead son, who died of dehydration in the Israeli Army during boot camp. Two orthodox Jewish boys, Shlomi and Avinoam, accost Keren for her "despicable lifestyle" and for being a whore, a "stain on the community" by getting pregnant out of wedlock.

When Tarek presses the button, nothing happens; the switch has shorted out. Noticing Katz's repair shop, the frustrated suicide bomber inquires about a replacement switch - claiming he needs it for a generator at the nearby construction site - but the electrician says he'll have to wait until Sunday morning after Shabbat. By cellphone Tarek informs Abed and Salim of his predicament; he's given until Sunday morning to perform his assignment, but reminded that his father's life also is at stake.

A series of fortuitous coincidences follow - Tarek volunteers to repair the leak in Katz's roof, ironically he saves Katz's wife Zipora from committing suicide, and he makes friends with Keren over coffee - in director Dror Zahari's tragic Palestinian-Israeli reality strapped to a romantic Romeo-and-Juliet fantasy (screenplay by Ido and Jonatan Dror).

Even with the Intifada and news report of a terrorist in the vicinity, everyone with whom he comes into contact acts with tolerant considerateness and hospitality toward Tarek, except for Shaul, the local parking attendant and son of Katz's friend and neighbor Rehavia, who eyes the Arab with suspicion because hatred is in their genes. Of Shaul, when he attempts to frisk Tarek, Katz feels no respect, threatening to report him to the authorities for impersonating a policeman as well as a human being.

Waking from a nightmare in Katz's home, where he's been invited to stay after dinner, Tarek goes outside just in time to rescue Keren from Avinoam and Shlomi's persecution. Without friends, Keren soon develops a romantic interest in Tarek, telling him, "I feel like I'm exploding," after introducing him to her mother and explaining why she's a pariah to her father: "If I knew there was life after death I'd kill myself."

He relates part of his story, telling her - "I'm angry at everyone except you" - how his father, formerly a violinist, took him daily from their home in Tulkarem to Nazareth across the border to train as a talented soccer player, but the Tanzim (militant faction of the Palestinian Fatah movement), suspecting Tarek's father of being an Israeli sympathizer, ruined the musician's career and the family's reputation.

Tarek, who has chosen this course of self-sacrifice to clear his family's name, unexpectedly discovers other possibilities may be within his reach if only he could get free of the deadly belt he's wearing while simultaneously extracting his parents from the Tanzim's grasp. It's as simple as solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

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Copyright © 2010 Patrick Ivers. All rights reserved.
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