ATZUM is currently working on a short documentary film to offer insight into the healing process in the aftermath of terror. Last week I had the privilege to be part of a conversation with two survivors of terror who are participating in this film. On the way home I had time to ponder something they said.
The conversation took place at the end of a very long, intense day. A. is directing the film. She is a 24-year-old survivor of terror seriously wounded in high school on a Jerusalem bus. She suffered burns on most of her body and many of her facial bones were broken. Today Adar is in her third year of film school at a Tel-Aviv College.
We filmed all day, starting in Sderot and ending in Tel-Aviv . It was late at night and I had just finished interviewing S., a 28-year-old music student whose father was murdered in an off-shore terror attack when she was four years old. During the interview, S. spoke candidly about constantly seeking out people who knew her father and her quest for answers to circumstances surrounding his murder.
The cameras stopped rolling and there were several minutes of silence. I asked S. how she felt:
“I feel great, it’s good to get it out. I can’t talk about my life to just anyone.”
Despite her quest for information about her father and the terror attack, she consciously alters her biography when meeting new people.
“I used to tell people my father was murdered in a terror attack, but I could not deal with their responses “They don’t know what to ask , they don’t know what to say.”
A. replied, “I have long done the same. When someone sees the burn scars on my hand and asks me what happened, I tell them a lie,– that I cut myself in kindergarten-I don’t want to deal with the awkward responses.”
When people hear that I am the ATZUM social worker, they often remark they would never want to listen to other people’s problems all day.
The fact is sometimes it is sad, heartbreaking, frustrating, angering – but it is also a learning experience and highly rewarding. We listen and guide, we re-educate and offer assistance, we initiate change and we learn.
This film has taken on new meaning. It’s not just about giving voice to the trauma and the struggle to recover. It is about how we, you, me, the community as a whole, respond to those struggles. It is that dialogue, between those who wish to speak out and we who must learn to listen, that gives voice to the challenge of change.
