RSS
New Play Opening in NY Recounts Verbatim Testimonies From Oct. 7 Survivors, Families of Victims
Phelim McAleer speaking to civilians in Israel affected by the Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attacks in a trailer for the play “October 7.” Photo: YouTube screenshot
A trailer was released on Wednesday for a play opening in New York next month that is comprised entirely of eyewitness accounts of Hamas’ Oct. 7 terrorist attacks in Israel using only the actual words of survivors and families of victims.
The play, titled October 7, was produced by Phelim McAleer and Ann McElhinney, two Irish documentary filmmakers, screenwriters, New York Times best-selling authors, and veteran investigative journalists. The married couple traveled to Israel in November to interview those affected by the deadly massacre in southern Israel, in which roughly 1,200 people were slaughtered by Hamas terrorists who also took more than 200 others as hostages back to the Gaza Strip. McAleer and McElhinney traveled throughout Israel for roughly three weeks, speaking to survivors and also families of victims about how they went about their day on Oct. 6 and how their lives changed the following morning.
“We’ve covered many shocking stories but nothing comes close to what the men, women, and children of Israel faced [on Oct. 7],” McElhinney said in the trailer for the play, which provides first-hand witness accounts of what happened in their own words, without editing. “The world wants you to forget about what happened that day. The day that everything changed. We refuse to let that happen.”
McAleer added: “We’ll bring you the truth they don’t want you to hear.”
The filmmakers debuted the trailer for October 7 during the Wednesday episode of their podcast, The Ann and Phelim Scoop. McAleer also explained their desire for wanting to make the play.
“When we were in Ireland and in Europe — and even since [Oct. 7] — we’ve noticed that everyone wants to talk about Gaza, even on Oct. 8,” he said. “They didn’t want to talk about Oct. 7. They don’t want to talk about Oct. 7. Which is the exact reason why we say, ‘You should talk about Oct. 7.’ Because there was a ceasefire on Oct. 6, do you remember that? There would be no need for a ceasefire [now] if it wasn’t for Oct. 7 [and] if the hostages were released. There would be no need for a ceasefire if Hamas surrendered. But, they’re not going to do that. So we want people to remember, as they say in Hollywood, the ‘origin story’ for the war in Gaza.”
Rehearsals have began for the play, and the production is almost fully cast. McAleer said that during a recent table read with actors in New York, “most of the actors were crying at the end.”
“They were laughing too,” he added. ‘There’s a lot of humor. I know everyone finds humor in the darkest places, but I tell you, the Jewish people, they’ve had a lot of dark places but, boy, do they find humor. So there’s even jokes in [the play]. And I didn’t write the jokes. The play is 100 percent verbatim. It’s the voices of people who lived through Israel’s darkest day.”
When they first announced October 7 on their podcast in late March, McElhinney said the play will be filmed and available to those who cannot attend the show in-person. The play will additionally travel in the fall to “every Ivy League college that needs to know the truth about Oct. 7,” McAleer said, such as Harvard, Princeton, and the University of Pennsylvania.
“Ultimately this play is very uplifting,” McElhinney explained. “These people are extraordinary. All these different people, Israelis, who had survived, are heroes from every kind of walk of life.”
October 7 will run from May 2 – June 16 at the Actors Temple Theatre in New York City.
The post New Play Opening in NY Recounts Verbatim Testimonies From Oct. 7 Survivors, Families of Victims first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels
View of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) building in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib / Flash90.
i24 News – Sweden will no longer fund the U.N. refugee agency for Palestinians (UNRWA) and will instead provide humanitarian assistance to Gaza via other channels, the Scandinavian country said on Friday.
The decision comes on the heels of multiple revelations regarding the agency’s employees’ involvement in the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led massacre in southern Israel that triggered the war in Gaza.
Sweden’s decision was in response to the Israeli ban, as it will make channeling aid via the agency more difficult, the country’s aid minister, Benjamin Dousa, said.
“Large parts of UNRWA’s operations in Gaza are either going to be severely weakened or completely impossible,” Dousa said. “For the government, the most important thing is that support gets through.”
The Palestinian embassy in Stockholm said in a statement: “We reject the idea of finding alternatives to UNRWA, which has a special mandate to provide services to Palestinian refugees.”
Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel thanked Dousa for a meeting they had this week and for Sweden’s decision to drop its support for UNRWA.
“There are worthy and viable alternatives for humanitarian aid, and I appreciate the willingness to listen and adopt a different approach,” she said.
The post Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Pope Calls Gaza Airstrikes ‘Cruelty’ After Israeli Minister’s Criticism
Pope Francis waves after delivering his traditional Christmas Day Urbi et Orbi speech to the city and the world from the main balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican, December 25, 2021. Photo: REUTERS/Yara Nardi
Pope Francis on Saturday again condemned Israeli airstrikes in Gaza, a day after an Israeli government minister publicly denounced the pontiff for suggesting the global community should study whether the military offensive there constitutes a genocide of the Palestinian people.
Francis opened his annual Christmas address to the Catholic cardinals who lead the Vatican’s various departments with what appeared to be a reference to Israeli airstrikes on Friday that killed at least 25 Palestinians in Gaza.
“Yesterday, children were bombed,” said the pope. “This is cruelty. This is not war. I wanted to say this because it touches the heart.”
The pope, as leader of the 1.4-billion-member Roman Catholic Church, is usually careful about taking sides in conflicts, but he has recently been more outspoken about Israel’s military campaign against Palestinian terrorist group Hamas.
In book excerpts published last month, the pontiff said some international experts said that “what is happening in Gaza has the characteristics of a genocide.”
Israeli Minister of Diaspora Affairs Amichai Chikli sharply criticized those comments in an unusual open letter published by Italian newspaper Il Foglio on Friday. Chikli said the pope’s remarks amounted to a “trivialization” of the term genocide.
Francis also said on Saturday that the Catholic bishop of Jerusalem, known as a patriarch, had tried to enter the Gaza Strip on Friday to visit Catholics there, but was denied entry.
The patriarch’s office told Reuters it was not able to comment on the pope’s remarks about the patriarch being denied entry.
Israeli officials were not immediately reachable for comment on Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath, and the Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The post Pope Calls Gaza Airstrikes ‘Cruelty’ After Israeli Minister’s Criticism first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
IDF Pledges to Implement Lessons from Failure to Intercept Houthi Missile
Iranian-backed Yemeni terrorist leader Abdul-Malik al-Houthi. Photo: Screenshot
i24 News – The Israeli military said on Saturday that while the investigation into the failure to intercept the missile that hit Tel Aviv early in the morning was still ongoing, some lessons were already being implemented. The ballistic missile, fired by Yemen’s Houthi jihadists, landed at a playground in a residential area, leading to 16 people sustaining injuries from glass shards.
Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesperson said that “some of the conclusions have already been implemented, in regards of both interception and early warning.”
The spokesperson added that “no further details regarding aerial defense activities and the alert system can be disclosed due to operational security considerations.”
The Houthis have repeatedly fired drones and missiles towards Israel in what they describe as “acts of solidarity” with Palestinians in Gaza.
The post IDF Pledges to Implement Lessons from Failure to Intercept Houthi Missile first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
You must be logged in to post a comment Login