Nationalism has an inbuilt tendency of demonizing ‘the enemy’ and the rise of xenophobia and on the other side justifying one’s self-righteousness. In fact, history is filled with fallacies that are fabricated to serve a political agenda of the nationalists. It is interesting to note that most nations are forged from others while advancing nationalism. Some notions are portrayed that some countries are based on a mythological view of the history and hatred of foreigners. The Middle East share some of these negative traits of nationalism with a variety of such cases, including non-Arabs. The basis of this paper is to analyze the representation of the nationalism in the Middle East and its connection to the cinema. The scope of this research will be fixed to the portrayal of the fundamentalism in the Arab world in the 1960 film, “Exodus.”
Background
In the nineteenth century, the Middle East saw a rise in various nationalisms with various uprising and collaborations witnessed. The region has a heterogeneity in geography, religion, and linguistics, which have all contributed to the rise of the numerous and antagonistic nationalist arrangements all in the name of gaining control of the region. Among the factors listed above, the most important is the religion, which acted as a fuel together with the contact with the West to form a collective identity. The Christian minority became the first to establish nationalist movements before the Muslim majority of the region took over. The most significant advancement of such campaigns is the Maronites of Mount Lebanon together with the Armenians of Anatolia ( Laqueur, 2016) .
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These two took hold in the nineteenth century due to their constructs that emphasized their separateness historically and the right to autonomy politically. The contact that Lebanon had with Europe made her secure political autonomy within the Ottoman Empire, which was the superior force in the Middle East by the 1800s.However, the Armenian case was different as they formed an active nationalist movement to battle with the Ottoman state as well as the Kurdish and the Turkish ( Laqueur, 2016) . This uprising saw the Ottoman government massacre the Armenians for fear of nationalism. The Turkish and Arab nationalisms were due to the need for a firm ethnic identity. The discovery of European Turkology and the recognition of the pre-Islamic history Turkish language in central Asia gave it a distinction from the Muslim community in the Ottoman Empire which had multiple languages.
For the Arabs, the blossoming of Arabic literature and history led to what is known as “Arab Awakening.” The other bit was the Zionist movement of the Jewish nationalism rose from the uniqueness and solidarity among the Jews thus did not need the discoveries as seen in the Arabs and Turkish case. The rich tapestry, the Judaism’s liturgical language (Hebrew), and the common isolation and discrimination that the Jews living in Europe faced, acted as a solidification agent to the nationalist movements. Zionism was encouraged by the bit of gradual assimilation of Jews in some parts of the European countries during the nineteenth century, and due to the growing European anti-Semitism phenomenon, which led to them doubting their future as people in the states that defined Jews as aliens. The rising heat of the anti-Semitism in Russian Empire in the 1880s led to the Zionist societies to respond by organizing the immigration of Jews into Palestine, then under Ottoman Empire. This led to the formation of World Zionist Organization (WZO) in 1897 ( Tobias, 2016) whose declaration was “to create for the Jewish people a homeland in Palestine secured by public law.” In the years before World War I, the organization worked to encourage migration of Jews to the distinctive Jewish institutions in Palestine.
Methodology
The methodology involved in this paper is to analyze the 1960 film referring to the crucial scenes and comparing them to the actual events in history. The enthusiasm with which the film was perceived makes it worth reviewing as there is some depiction of one of the nationalism that does not match the actual characteristics.
If history is anything to go by, all the ‘isms’ led to war, and Zionism was no exception to this ideal. Because there was Arab nationalism in Palestine, what ensued would later lead to the changed history of that country. Israel would be created in the country of Palestine after series of conflicts and fatal wars between the two nationalisms. During the migration, the British became involved and considered this moved divine through its foreign minister Arthur Balfour when he announced in 1917 that the country supported the Jewish institutional home in Palestine ( Chapman, 2015) . When the British took over from Ottoman Empire in 1919, they started a mass exodus of Jews into Palestine which leads to protests from the Arabs who feared that their land would be taken thus demanded independence and the abortion of Jewish migration. The British tried to reconcile the two factions to co-exist together in peace by saying that the Jewish could not occupy the whole of Palestine area and they would not interfere with the Palestine Arabs’ rights. What the government did not understand was the profound cultural and religious differences that existed between the Arabs and the Jews. The events of the creation of what is today known as Israel is what the film “Exodus” tries to narrate to the audience.
Results
Based on the novel by Leon Uris, Exodus is viewed as one of the most touching stories on the struggles for independence that the Jews faced under the British rule. In 1960, the story was then adopted into a three and a half hour-long film, under the production of Otto Preminger. The movie starred some of the most excellent actors and actresses in America; Paul Newman playing the role of ‘Ari Ben Canaan,’ a protagonist, while Eva Marie Saint as an attractive American nurse ‘Kitty Fremont.’ This film is widely considered as a Zionist epic that has revealed the stimulated rise of Israel and the support by the United States. Many commentators believe that the movie softened its sentiments on anti-British and anti-Arabs of the novel. However, the depiction of the Arab-Israeli conflict still manifests with what many commentators believe to be lasting results of American perception of the turmoil in the Middle East ( Goodman, 2014) . Here, two nationalisms are at war with one another with one (Arabs) claiming that they have the right to Palestine lands, while the other (Zionists) seeks to be included in the area due to the rising discrimination in Europe.
Arguments
Concerned with the founding of Israel as an independent state in 1947, Exodus concentrates on the efforts that six hundred and eleven survivors of the Holocaust used to defy the orders of the blocking the ways by the British government and set Exodus to sail towards Palestine. Many Jews are held in an internment camp in Cyprus, where Kitty Fremont works as an American volunteer. Barred from accessing Palestine, the Jews wait anxiously on the day they will be set free. One leader, Paul Newman is willing to risk his life and that of the other refugees by smuggling the inmates out of the camp for a voyage to Palestine which is illegal. When the British finally agrees to let Exodus pass safely to Palestine, other thirty thousand Jews who were interred, also flee to what they call “Holy Land ( Chapman, 2015) .”
When they get to Palestine, the opposition to partition the land into Jewish and Arab states become heated prompting one Jew, Don Landau, to proclaim his desire to side with the Irgun, a radical underground network that promotes Zionism ( Goodman, 2014) . Dozens of fatalities arise after he successfully bombs the King David Hotel which makes him turn himself in so that he can apply his knowledge on explosives to plan a prison break. This plan succeeds thus causing hundreds of prisoners to escape in Acre. With an independent Israel in sight, the Arabs stage an attack on the Jewish villages. Led by Mohammed Amin al-Husayni, the Arab nationalists attack the town of Gan Dafna where they kill many people in an overnight assault, and among them is Karen, a young Danish girl who is acquainted with both Dov and Kitty. During their funeral, Paul Newman swears on their bodies that one day the Arabs and the Jews would be sharing Palestine in peace, both in life and death.
Exodus then gives each party a chance to put forth their argument, with Ari’s uncle (Irgun’s leader) explains that war is necessary to force the British out of Palestine. On the other hand, Ari’s Arab friend is treated as a traitor by the firm leadership when he coexists with the Jews. The British general says that they only follow orders and they also wish to leave Palestine as much as anybody wants they go. The movie thus takes the side of the Zionists and endorses their arguments and focuses on their need to create a country of Palestine as it soothes the founding of Israel in romantic terms ( Goodman, 2014) . The Zionists are portrayed as the legitimate people to gain the control of the power in their quest for independence. This satisfies the motive of nationalism to create a notion of “us against them.” The fact that this movie can get away with overtly defending one side in a controversial event of history such as the Arab-Israel conflict is still a surprise by the standards that are politically charged ( Goodman, 2014) . The political overtones were highly overlooked in the movie as the public responded to the film during its release.
Exodus creates the sense that the Jewish struggle is a justified representation of the universal fight for freedom over oppression. They are the oppressed in this case and are portrayed as the fulfillment of the Biblical prophecy in which God told the Israelites He would take them to the Promised Land ( Chapman, 2015) . The Book of Exodus in the Bible is an ancient account of the story of Israel which both Christians and Muslims discuss because they have the same early accounts of biblical history. The story is engrained in the audience of people who are suffering from the actual history of Holocaust horrifies the audience thus creating a sense of sympathy towards the Zionists, thus further justifying their quest for freedom in Palestine ( Tobias, 2016) . The overall theme of this film is to propagate a pro-Zionism propaganda, based on the founding of Israel in 1948 as it unfolds the discrimination of the Jews in the diaspora as well as the struggles of forming an independent Israel.
In conclusion, the movie “Exodus” is trying to take sides by leaning towards the Jews by portraying them as heroes in their struggle for independence. To me, this is different from the actual events in history where the director of the movie tries to appeal to viewers dramatically. Thus, the film is not suitable for studying the real events that took place prior that led to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The movie ignores one side of the coin in the whole story- the Arabs. It only portrays them as villains by showing the robust bravery that the Zionists felt towards the creation of Israel. Thus, it is deemed a pro-Zionist propaganda as it forgets the Arabs’ side of the story. The film does some promotion of newly-formed Israel nation to the American public than any other form of media ( Goodman, 2014) . Produced just fifteen years after the end of the Holocaust, it was aimed at redeeming the Jews and the shame they faced by showing their weakness during the fateful event ( Tobias, 2016) .
References
Chapman, C. (2015). Whose Promised Land?: The continuing conflict over Israel and Palestine . Lion Books.
Gelvin, J. L. (2014). The Israel-Palestine conflict: One hundred years of war . Cambridge University Press.
Goodman, G. (2014). “Operation Exodus”: Israeli government involvement in the production of Otto Preminger's Film Exodus (1960). Journal of Israeli History , 33 (2), 209-229.
Laqueur, W. Z. (Ed.). (2016). The Middle East in transition: studies in contemporary history . Routledge.
Tobias, J. G. (2016). The Liberation of the Camps. The End of the Holocaust and its Aftermath.
