Pierre Rehov

Summary

Pierre Rehov is the pseudonym of a FrenchIsraeli documentary filmmaker, director and novelist, most known for his movies about the Arab–Israeli conflict and Israeli–Palestinian conflict, its treatment in the media, and about terrorism.[1][2][3][4][5][6] Rehov is also a fiction writer, whose novels have enjoyed some success in France, and several have been translated into English and German.

Life edit

Rehov was born to a Jewish family[7] from Algiers, when Algeria was still a French department. He experienced terrorism at a young age when his school was the target of a terror attack conducted by the "FLN" (Algerian National Front of "Liberation"). In 1961, his family became a part of pieds-noirs (non-Muslim inhabitants of Algeria) fleeing from Algeria in fear of massacres. (A purge in Algeria led to the massacre of close to 200,000 people).[8] A later film on Jewish refugees (Silent Exodus) described the fate of Jews who were expelled from or fled Muslim countries between 1948 and 1974. He chose not to describe his own community from Algeria, since the Algerian war was a colonial problem involving France more than the Jewish community, although he recalls that Jews in Algeria had been suffering from Muslim antisemitism for centuries, before Algeria was part of France.

Rehov says he was not any sort of activist until he saw the death of Muhammad al-Durrah on television, and doubted its authenticity.[9] He was the first to conduct a journalistic investigation into the murder of al-Durrah whom he still believes was the victim of the Palestinian propaganda machine. It was later demonstrated in a French court that Al Durah could not have been killed by Israeli soldiers.

Rehov claims that every reporter must be (or appear to be) pro-Palestinian to work in the Palestinian territories safely and this, among other things, creates systematic anti-Israeli bias, especially on French media outlets. He advocates a two-state solution, for Palestinians and Israelis to live side by side, but does not believe that peace will be possible for many generations. He puts the blame on the Palestinian Authority and Hamas, that would have no interest in solving the conflict through negocations since the United Nations and the European Union are biased against Israel.

In January 2008, Rehov was embedded in the 4/1 US cavalry in Baghdad and Durah, where he filmed hours of dailies, showing the situation in Iraq from the field. Those images are part of his documentary The Path to Darkness.

In 2008 Rehov moved to the United States due to what he described as a growing climate of antisemitism in France and the rest of Europe. Three years later, in November 2011, he moved to Tel Aviv, Israel, where he now lives.

As a journalist and commentator, he writes regulartly in Le Figaro, Valeurs Actuelle, The Gatestone Institute, The Jerusalem Post and many political blogs, including Dreuz and Atlantico.

Rehov is married to Sharon Yambem, a Jewish immigrant to Israel from India. From a previous mariage he has a son, who lives in Singapore and a daughter who is an actrice and lives in New York. A third child was born in 2022 from his second marriage.

Filmography edit

  • The Road to Jenin – a response to Jenin, Jenin, a controversial documentary produced by Mohammed Bakri, in order to portray what Bakri calls "the Palestinian truth" about the "Battle of Jenin". The film lists number of casualties acknowledged by both Palestinians and Israelis.
  • The Trojan Horse – this film demonstrates that Yasser Arafat's true intentions were not a two-state solution, but a Palestinian state on the territory of all of Israel.
  • Holy Land - Christians in Peril[10] – a film which exposes the flight of Christians from PA-controlled lands.
  • Silent Exodus – a film about the Jewish exodus from Arab lands.
  • Hostages of Hatred – how the Palestinian right of return, supported by the UN, has left Palestinians in camps for half a century and, as Rehov argues, originated the present unsolvable situation in the Middle East.
  • From The River to the Sea was voted Best Film at the 2006 Liberty Film Festival
  • The War of Images
  • Suicide Killers – 2006 documentary film that purports to explore the psychological condition of suicide bombers.[11][12] Released in theaters, in New York and Los Angeles, and distributed on DVD by WEA, Suicide Killers was considered for the Hollywood Oscars but not nominated.
  • First comes Saturday, then Comes Sunday – 2007 documentary film about the persecution of Christians under Islamic rule in the Middle East[13]
  • The Path to Darkness – 2011
  • War Crimes in Gaza – 2015
  • Beyond Deception Strategy – 2015
  • Unveiling Jerusalem – 2017
  • Behind the smokescreen" - 2018
  • Pay for Slay - 2019
  • Palestinian Apartheid - 2019
  • The origins of the Palestinian Cause - 2019
  • Terror, racket and corruption - 2019
  • Palestine, the invention of a Nation - 2019
  • The Sunday People - 2019
  • Palestinian animal abuse - 2019
  • Violence and discrimination - 2020
  • Lies and tears (A counter investigation into Shireen Abu Akleh's death)

Note: most his films are available on Vimeo.[14]

Novels edit

  • Cellules Blanches – Published by the major French publisher, Albin Michel. Published in Germany under the title Wesse Zellen and in English under the title "Beyond Red Lines". Soon to be published in Spanish and Italian. A thriller about counter-terrorism.
  • Tu seras si jolie - Published by Belfond. June 2018
  • Ted - Published by "La Mécanique Générale". January 2019
  • Beyond red lines - Published by "Thirty Trees". March 2020
  • The Third Testament - Published by "Thirty Trees". July 2021
  • 88 - Published by "Cosmopolis". February 2021
  • Amnesia - Published by "Cosmopolis". March 2022
  • Red Eden - Published by Thirty Trees. May 2022
  • Nuit Américaine - Published by Cosmopolis. September 2022

See also edit

References edit

  1. ^ "The U.S., Churchill and the Middle East By PIERRE REHOV". Yonkers Tribune. 2017-05-22. Retrieved 2018-01-21.
  2. ^ Keller-Lind, Hélène (2017-12-21). "'Unveiling Jerusalem' Pierre Rehov's film debunks UNESCO revision of past". The Jerusalem Post | JPost.com. Retrieved 2018-01-21.
  3. ^ "Syrie, Iran, Chine, Israël : la nouvelle diplomatie américaine de Donald Trump". FIGARO (in French). 2017-05-05. Retrieved 2018-01-21.
  4. ^ Markind, Johanna (2017-12-22). "New Film Beautifully Showcases Jerusalem Archaeology to Rebut Historical Revisionism". Algemeiner.com. Retrieved 2018-01-21.
  5. ^ "Réfugiés palestiniens : pourquoi Trump coupe les vivres à l'UNRWA". FIGARO (in French). 2018-01-18. Retrieved 2018-01-21.
  6. ^ "Israël Palestijns conflict / Wat drijft Palestijnse zelfmoordenaars?". Joods Actueel. 2019-05-18. Retrieved 2019-09-05.
  7. ^ "The mind of a suicide bomber / A politically incorrect film explores the bomb bearers' many motivations". SFGate. 2006-10-22. Retrieved 2018-01-21.
  8. ^ Chesler, Dr. Phyllis (2009-04-22). "Pierre Rehov: Lion In Exile". The Jewish Press. Retrieved 2018-01-21.
  9. ^ "So You Want to Be a Hamas Terrorist?". Israel National News. Retrieved 21 January 2018.
  10. ^ Justus Reid Weiner (2005). Human Rights of Christians in Palestinian Society. Jerusalem Ctr Public Affairs. pp. 6–. ISBN 978-965-218-048-3.
  11. ^ Lee, Nathan (2006-08-25). "Suicide Killers - Review". Movies. Retrieved 2018-01-21.
  12. ^ Rehov, Pierre (2007-04-30). "Suicide Killers". HuffPost. Retrieved 2018-01-21.
  13. ^ comes Saturday, then Comes Sunday Middle East Studio. middleeaststudio.com, undated.
  14. ^ "Fact checking on Vimeo". vimeo.com. Retrieved Mar 23, 2023.

External links edit