With Hasan in Gaza

Kamal Aljafari revives a lost Gaza through his miniDV archives, recreating with great warmth a place filled with life, memories, and resilience.

In November 2001, Kamal Aljafari travelled to Gaza in the midst of the Second Intifada to look for a man with whom he had been imprisoned in 1989. With the guide Hasan, the journey becomes a mapping of identity and historiography. Many years later, Aljafari rediscovers his footage and the memories return: of a Gaza where children swim and smile, and where people defy the absurdities of everyday life. With Hasan in Gaza becomes a cinematic revolt in which memories transform into active resistance. Through the recovered images, a lost yet vivid place emerges, along with a powerful sense of presence

• Sanjin Pejković