The human face of Israel’s protest movement

“Israel is complicated, very complicated,” Hatikvah Australia president Nirit Eylon told a Melbourne audience after a screening of Rising: Voices of Protest and Hope. She was praising the film’s makers for demonstrating that complexity.

Director Esther Takac wrote, directed and produced the documentary. She is a psychologist specialising in trauma, and she builds the film around five people rather than a thesis. This includes bereaved father Eran Litman, Elana Kaminka, whose son was killed saving his comrades, choreographer Oded Ronen, tech entrepreneur Moshe Radman, and trauma psychologist Ayellet Wider Cohen.

It begins with the protests against the government’s judicial overhaul, which drew hundreds of thousands of people for 38 consecutive weeks. Then it turns to October 7.

Tatac explained that the idea for the film came after that day when she and her husband, both Hebrew-speaking psychologists, flew to Israel to help however they could. She began filming and met Wider Cohen and Litman early on.

“I saw these people themselves hurting and grieving, standing up to help each other,” she said. For Takac, they embody what Israel really is.