Leila Khaled

Documentary. September 1970: a BOAC flight with 20 school children on board was hijacked in the name of a Palestinian guerrilla group; the first and last time a British commercial aircraft has ever been hijacked. With hijacks attempted on five planes in total, this was just one part of an audacious plan called Skyjack Sunday. With interviews from hostages and their hijackers, Timewatch goes back to the time when air travel changed for ever.

On their way back from the Cannes Film Festival in 1971, filmmakers Wakamatsu Koji and Adachi Masao visited Lebanon to meet Japan's Red Army faction and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine to shoot a newsreel film promoting the Palestinian resistance. Conceived as a ‘declaration of world war’ that implicates us all, the directors capture the everyday banality of military training and preparation exercises for imminent battle.

Twelve Palestinian women sit before us and talk of their life before the Diaspora, of their memories, of their lives and of their identity. Their narratives are connected by the enduring thread of the ancient art of embroidery. Twelve resilient, determined and articulate women from disparate walks of life: lawyers, artists, housewives, activists, architects, and politicians stitch together the story of their homeland, of their dispossession, and of their unwavering determination that justice will prevail. Through their stories, the individual weaves into the collective, yet remaining distinctly personal. Twelve women, twelve life-spans, and stories from Palestine; a land whose position was fixed on the map of the world, but is now embroidered on its face.

Leila Khaled was the first woman to hijack a plane. In 1969, she showed her grenades to the terrified passengers by order of the Che Guevara commando unit of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. Through the ensuing media bombardment, she put the Palestinian nation on the global map. The pretty 24-year-old Leila became a hero to many Palestinians, including the Swedish/Palestinian teenager Lina Makboul, who is now a filmmaker. At least Leila dared to do something, Lina thought at the time. She visits Leila 35 years later with a camera, and finds a woman who does not regret anything.

Inspirées par les révolutions étudiantes de 1968, deux femmes, Ulrike Meinhof et Fusako Shigenobu, respectivement en Allemagne et au Japon ont commandité les groupes révolutionnaires des Red Army Faction (Rotee Armee Fraktion) et Japanese Red Army (日本赤軍). Pour quelle cause se sont-elles battues et qu'ont-elles tiré de cela ?

Seven militant women (fedaiyat) of the revolutionary generation tell the story of the Palestinian resistance through accounts of their own lives. Cut from 35 hours of interviews with leaders of the armed struggle, the film presents an image of confident, unapologetic and proud feminine identity. Together, the memories of these women narrate the dream of a generation, yet unrealized.

Deals with the memories of Palestinian female guerilla fighters, currently in their forties, who were involved in military operations during their teen years.