PRESSKIT G E B R U E D E R B E E T Z F I L M P R O D U K T I O N

LEBANON BORDERS OF BLOOD

A DOCUMENTARY BY GEBRUEDER BEETZ FILMPRODUCTION HAMBURG AND ZYGOTE FILMS 1X90MIN, HD, 2020 KAN IN CO-PRODUKTION WITH WDR AND ARTE

LEBANON - BORDERS OF BLOOD

AS LEBANON TODAY IS ON THE VERGE OF COLLAPSE, A LOOK BACK INTO THE COUNTRY’S HISTORY EXPLORES HOW A SMALL REGIONAL CONFLICT DEVELOPED INTO A MAJOR GEOPOLITICAL CRISIS.

FIRST BROADCAST: ARTE 17 NOVEMBER 2020 PRESSKIT G E B R U E D E R B E E T Z F I L M P R O D U K T I O N

SUMMARY

DOCUMENTARY LEBANON - BORDERS OF BLOOD

THE DOCUMENTARY 03

BACKGROUND 04

INTERVIEWEES 05

THE FILMMAKERS 07

CREDITS 08

CONTACT 09

BROADCAST: 17 NOVEMBER, 8:15 PM, ARTE PRESSKIT G E B R U E D E R B E E T Z F I L M P R O D U K T I O N 03

LEBANON - BORDERS OF BLOOD SYNOPSIS

Today, the very existence of Lebanon is in queston. For the Palestnians, Lebanon was a training ground With rampant politcal corrupton, hostlity bet- for their batle to reclaim historical Palestne. For the ween sects and communites, the dominant presen- Syrians, Lebanon was an inseparable piece of Greater ce of militas and warlords, and now, a global pan- wrongfully taken by colonialist forces. For the demic on top of an economic meltdown, Lebanon Americans, Lebanon was their most disastrous and is in a fragile state. The ever resilient Lebanese costly foreign interventon since Vietnam. And for contnue to rise up, to stop yet another cycle that the Israelis, Lebanon was their Vietnam. could quickly turn it into a failed state. For the past Caught up in the chaos were the Lebanese themsel- 15 years, Iran and its proxy , have been ves – made up of diferent sects, religions and ethni- the controlling power in Lebanon. But Iran is not the cites – writng their own history in a string of politcal frst power that tried to rule the country. Lebanon‘s assassinatons, massacres and betrayals. To under- history is a sequence of regional players atemptng stand Lebanon is to understand the . to rule over it, leaving it in a state of destructon and a sea of blood. To understand Lebanon is to under- LEBANON - BORDERS OF BLOOD is about how a series stand the Middle East; a boiling pot that erupts and of disastrous decisions can shape the destny of mil- engulfs the region and extends far beyond. lions. With an impressive array of interviewees from all sides, we uncover new revelaton on some of the The story of Lebanon is one of ongoing tragedy. A key events: the breakout of the Lebanese Civil War, march of follies orchestrated by heads of state, sects the Israeli invasion, Sabra and Shatla massacre, the and militas. The Palestnians, French, Britsh, Irani- bombing of the Marines compound, the assassina- ans, Syrians, Americans, Israelis and the Lebanese tons of Lebanon’s presidents, the rise of Hezbollah, themselves, have all, at one point or another, contri- and untl the widespread demonstratons in Lebanon buted to the country’s tragic history. today.

BROADCAST: 17 NOVEMBER, 8:15 PM, ARTE PRESSKIT G E B R U E D E R B E E T Z F I L M P R O D U K T I O N 04 BACKGROUND

LEBANON - BORDERS OF BLOOD portrays the his- Anyone visitng the capital will fnd themselves tory of the country, told chronologically from WWI in a metropolis with a vibrant nightlife, breathtaking through the 1975 civil war to the catastrophic Beirut beaches, a lively arts and intellectual scene. port explosion in August, 2020. On the other side, the city has long been a center The documentary focuses on the connectons to of atracton for terrorist organizatons, a retreat for German and French history. It provides insights into warlords and drug dealers, or a backdrop for secret today‘s proxy wars and the infuence of the pow- service killing squads. erful Gulf States as well as the interests of global players—China, Saudi Arabia and the United States. Lebanon is sitng on a huge mountain of weapons paired with an explosive mixture of confictng inte- Lebanon is a powder keg of 18 diferent, partally rests of internal politcal partes and foreign powers. hostle religious communites in a de facto incapa- Sunnis, Shiites and Christans compete for power - citated state where every fourth inhabitant is a refu- ofen by force. They are supported by countries like gee. Once called the „Switzerland of the Orient,“ Le- Saudi Arabia and Iran, which in turn are fghtng for banon appears as a western paradise trapped in the supremacy in the region. But Israel, the Europeans hell of conficts in the Middle East. The flm is exten- and the United States also infuence and fuel the sively researched, with spectacular mined archives, country‘s internal conficts. the history of the region and its changing geopolitcal infuence by the West is reappraised. Since the fghtng between Israel and Hezbollah in 2006, the country has been divided into two hostle A panorama of world politcs opens up through the politcal camps. The de facto confict makes the state study of Lebanon. Startng from the country‘s preca- and its insttutons unable to act or govern. rious situaton today, the flm looks back at its his- tory, which is surprisingly closely linked to us Euro- With the more recent Syrian war, which triggered peans. French colonialism and its consequences, the large fows of refugees, this changed the politcal si- two world wars leading to Lebanon‘s independence, tuaton in Germany, France and all other European the founding of the State of Israel, the escalaton of Union countries as it becomes clear that the situat- the Middle East confict, the Cold War, the terrorism on in the Middle East is highly relevant for the world of the 1970s on European soil and the Israeli policy as a whole. of interventon -- all has had an impact on Lebanon. Looking at Lebanon therefore also means looking at Since more than a million refugees have fed to Le- the history of the French and the Germans - from a banon from the war zones in neighboring Syria, the new perspectve. Specifcally, with the turmoil of the situaton there has also become more acute. Cur- civil war and its afermath, Europeans have lef their rently, these refugees account for approximately one mark on the country, which is stained by contradic- quarter of the total populaton of Lebanon. In the tons like no other. shadow of the Syrian war, a new confict with global implicatons is thus looming.

BROADCAST: 17 NOVEMBER, 8:15 PM, ARTE PRESSKIT G E B R U E D E R B E E T Z F I L M P R O D U K T I O N 05

INTERVIEWEES

As we have been commited to tell the story of the conficts in Lebanon, we chose to illuminate individuals who were involved and directly impacted by chaos and tragic events as they unfolded over the years. We are very proud of the unprecedented access that we achieved and the quality of the interviewees. The research for this series was vast in its scope. It consisted of interviews with over 100 people — civili- ans, combatants, commanders, diplomats, intelligence ofcers, UN personnel, journalists, and policy-makers from ALL sides of the confict in Lebanon.

Lebanese interviewees Darina Al Joundi - Internatonally recognized Leba- Amin Gemayel - Christan Lebanese politcian and nese-born French actress and director, Al-Joundi por- president of Lebanon, 1982-1988. He succeeded his trayed Mrs. Youssef on the popular American strea- younger brother Bashir Gemayel in the presidency, ming series, “Homeland.“ She recollects and shares when he was assassinated afer only one week in of- stories of her childhood and youth in war-torn Bei- fce. rut. During the civil war, her family fed to Baghdad where one of the father‘s closest friends is a certain “Lebanon is a mosaic of partes, ethnicites. It’s the “Salem” -- later learning that this was in fact, Ilich weakness of Lebanon and the strength of it.” Ramirez Sánchez, the terrorist known as “Carlos the Jackal.“ Hanin Ghaddar - a Shia Lebanese natve, was a year old when the civil war began. She was a politcal Étenne Saqr - also known as Abu Arz, is a Lebane- actvist and a journalist for Lebanese newspapers se natonalist leader and founder of the right-wing As-Safr, An-Nahar, and Al-Hayat, and more recently, Christan-lead milita and politcal party, Guardians of longtme managing editor of Lebanon’s NOW news the Cedars. He and his milita lead the Lebanese war website. There she worked on a broad range of issues of independence against the Palestnians and Syri- including the evoluton of Hezbollah inside Lebanon’s ans in the 1970s and 1980s. Since 2000, he has been fractured politcal system through Iran’s growing in- living in exile. fuence throughout the Middle East. Currently, Ghad- dar is the Friedmann Fellow at The Washington Ins- Palestnian interviewee ttute’s Geduld Program on Arab Politcs, where she focus on Shia politcs throughout the Levant. Imad Shakur - a long-tme confdante of PLO leader Yasser Arafat, and his chief adviser on Israeli Afairs during and afer the Lebanese War, he tells the inside story of the evacuaton of Palestnian leaders from Beirut in 1982. BROADCAST: 17 NOVEMBER, 8:15 PM, ARTE PRESSKIT G E B R U E D E R B E E T Z F I L M P R O D U K T I O N 06

INTERVIEWEES

U.S. Interviewees Israeli interviewee Terry Anderson – an American journalist statoned Tzipi Livni – Former Israeli Foreign Minister (Minister in Beirut who reported for the Associated Press. In in various capacites, 2001-2009). Livni was a mem- 1985, he was taken hostage by Hezbollah militants ber of the cabinets of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and held in captvity for six years and nine months, and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. before his release in 1991.

German interviewee Ryan Crocker - A leading American diplomat who served in the Middle East since the 1970s. He was a Volker Schlöndorf— Film director of the novel of U.S. Ambassador to Lebanon, 1990-1993. President the same name “Circle of Deceit” by Nicolas Born, George W. Bush called him “America‘s Lawrence of is about a war reporter on assignment in 1981 Le- Arabia.” banon, while the civil war stll raging. The flm was set in the actual locatons of a completely destroyed Thomas L. Friedman – is an internatonally renowned Beirut. Schlöndorf won an Oscar for his flm “The author, reporter, and foreign afairs columnist for The Tin Drum.” New York Times--the recipient of three Pulitzer Prizes and the author of six bestselling books, among them “In 1962, Beirut was truly the Switzerland of the From Beirut to Jerusalem which chronicled his days Orient. There were the nightclubs, there were the as a reporter in Beirut during the Lebanese Civil War expensive restaurants, there were the expensive ho- and in Jerusalem through the frst year of the Intfa- tels, which by the way, we could not aford.“ da.

“We study these politcal science terms in college, ‘anarchy‘, but untl you‘ve seen a car driving back- wards 50 miles an hour to get away from a bombing scene or fghtng, or to escape a milita, you actually don‘t know what real ‚anarchy‘ looks like.”

BROADCAST: 17 NOVEMBER, 8:15 PM, ARTE PRESSKIT G E B R U E D E R B E E T Z F I L M P R O D U K T I O N 07 THE FILMMAKERS DUKI DROR Born in Tel Aviv and educated at UCLA and Columbia Filmography (Selecton) College in Chicago, Duki Dror is today one of Israel‘s 2002 Raging Dove (Sundance Channel) most prolifc documentary flmmakers. His extensi- ve oeuvre - his personal flms, character-oriented 2014 Partner With The Enemy and experimental documentaries, and his unique artst biographies - have brought him internatonal atenton and success. Drors are distributed world- 2016 Down The Deep, Dark Web (France 4) wide and are shown and awarded at numerous fes- tvals. His recent successes confrm his internatonal 2017 Inside The Mossad (on NETFLIX) presence.

REINHARDT BEETZ Filmography (Selecton) Reinhardt Beetz has been working for over 20 2017 Leningrad Symphony (NDR, ARTE, ORF, NRK) years as an editor, producer and director for ARD, ZDF, ARTE, NDR, MTV and various internatonal 2018 We Are The Half World (WDR, NDR/ ARTE, broadcasters. BR) Afer studying flm in Hamburg, he spent one and a half years in the USA, where he worked on nume- rous documentary flm productons for Discovery 2018 False Confessions (NDR) Channel. His special focus is on the development of scenic primetme TV mult-part productons for 2019 Outcast - The Persecuton Of The Hugenots the natonal and internatonal market as well as on (NDR/ARTE, RBB, WDR Bildung) format development and implementaton of new internet/TV formats.

DANA WOLFE Dana Wolfe is a fve-tme Emmy Award winning Canadian-born American journalist, television and debate producer.

BROADCAST: 17 NOVEMBER, 8:15 PM, ARTE PRESSKIT G E B R U E D E R B E E T Z F I L M P R O D U K T I O N 08

CREDITS

SCRIPT: Duki Dror, Reinhardt Beetz EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Reinhardt Beetz, GBF Itay Landsberg Nevo, EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Duki Dror ZYGOTE Dana Wolfe HEAD OF PRODUCTION: Rebecca Zaubel GBF DIRECTOR: Duki Dror HEAD OF PRODUCTION: Ali Adin ZYGOTE RESEARCH: Lior Amir Barmatz, Daniela SENIOR PRODUCER: Nadine Neumann GBF Reiss Razon, Hagit Ben SENIOR PRODUCER: Liat Kamal Eshed ZYGOTE Yaakov, Juliane Hribar EDITORAL OFFICE (KAN): Gili Gaon DOP: Ron Katzenelson, Matthias Inbal Petel Bolliger, Matthew Reber EDITORAL OFFICE (WDR): Christiane Hinz MOVIE EDITING: Joelle Alexis, Dana Wolfe, Thomas Kamp Gal Gofer, Jens Greuner MUSIC: Frank Ilfman SOUND DESIGN: Ronen Nagel GRADING: Ahron Peer SOUND DESIGN: Erez Levi, Pierre Brandt, Sascha Prangen NARRATOR: Gerhart Hinze

BROADCAST: 17 NOVEMBER, 8:15 PM, ARTE PRESSKIT G E B R U E D E R B E E T Z F I L M P R O D U K T I O N 09

CONTACT

Reinhardt Beetz Gebrüder Beetz Filmprodukton Hamburg GmbH & Co. KG Eppendorfer Weg 93a [D] 20259 Hamburg Germany [email protected] T +49 40 414 94 57 0

in coprodukton with

BROADCAST: 17 NOVEMBER, 8:15 PM, ARTE