The Law In These Parts

About The Film

A Grand Jury Prize winner at the Sundance Film Festival, THE LAW IN THESE PARTS is an unflinching examination of Israel’s contorted legal framework for governing Palestinians in the Occupied Territories, and the complex moral and legal dilemmas therein.

Since the 1967 War, inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza Strip have been subjected to what was intended as a temporary system of military rather than civilian justice, overseen by the Israeli Defense Forces. Adopting inventive filmmaking and investigative techniques, filmmaker Ra’anan Alexandrowicz (James’ Journey to Jerusalem) places now-retired judges, attorneys and generals on a cinematic witness stand to consider a number of troubling case studies, and the logic and repercussions of the Kafkaesque rule of law they helped to create. With historical footage projected behind them, interviewees submit to hard-hitting and often uncomfortable questions from which a core conundrum emerges: can a country sustain a prolonged military occupation without eroding its democratic values?

Best Documentary Award winner at the Jerusalem International Film Festival.