Rating: 
Summary: This is terrorist propaganda, the movie is FAKE,
Review: The amateur film "Gaza Strip" is total nonsense. This film presents a skewed picture of what is really happening in Gaza. The filmmaker allowed total lies to go on film, such as the supposed use of "poison gas" against Gaza Arabs. It is interesting that the only reports of "poison gas" or "nerve gas" being used, come from anti-Jewish newspapers printed for the Arab masses or websites run by Neo-Nazi and their friends Islamic terrorists. The only people gullible enough to believe these poison gas myths are those who have suffered under the corruption and oppression of Yasser Arafat and other terrorist dictators and monarchy that rule Arab people.If poison gas were used on a civilian population, there would be massive death counts, media from around the world would storm the area and pummel Israel in articles. This never happened, because the poison gas never happened. Even though thousands of Jews live in Gaza, none were shown or interviewed during this film. You can not rightly call something a documentary when it is so inherently biased. During the filming of Gaza Strip several things happened that affected Palestinian life. Between January and April of 2001 a palestinian terrorist from Gaza hijacked a bus and murdered 8 Israelis. Another incident involved a Jewish man living in Gaza who was lynched by Palestinian terrorists, much like the lynchings that occurred in the South of the United States in the 1800 and 1900's. There was also a Palestinian terrorist that shot and killed an Israeli soldier, causing travel restrictions and more checkpoints for an already poverished Gaza population.
Another problem with this film is the lack of continuity in scenes. One scene will show a tank rolling down the street with a particular lighting and sound and the next scene is of Palestinian terrorists who have just been injured in a firefight with the great Israeli Defense Forces. Nobody with high moral standards could ever support the terrorists in Gaza who use children as their shields when fighting against Israeli soldiers. These monsters indoctrinate kids in schools to teach them that murdering Jewish people Israelis and Americans is a noble deed. What they don't teach them is that their brainwashing to commit murder and glorify terrorists is destroying what little Palestinian civiliazation exists. Don't waste your time or money with this amaturish propaganda film. It was produced so that the masses of sheep would believe these lies and ignore the fact that there is another, TRUE side to this story.
Rating: 
Summary: Superb Documentary: shows it like it is
Review: This is an outstanding documentary movie that shows what life is like for Palestinians in Gaza during the first few months of the second Intifada. James Longley, a young American filmmaker spent 3 1/2 months in the Gaza strip filming 75 hours of footage for this documentary, and the product reflects an accurate picture of what life is like under occupation. This film is remarkable on many counts. First, unlike many documentaries I have seen, there is no narration whatsoever during the whole length of the documentary. I was anticipating Longley would interject a few words here and there to explain the background, but instead, he allows the characters filmed to speak for themselves. Thus "Gaza Strip" looks less like a documentary, without sacrificing the clarity of the work. Another remarkable accomplishment is that Longley filmed and put together the entire feature without knowing a word of Arabic. For editing the 74 minute documentary, he had to rely on a written translation of the 75 hours of original footage. This is an enormous accomplishment, considering the superb quality of the final movie. It is interesting to note also that the music was created by Longley himself, and the artistic quality of some of the scenes also deserve mention. "Gaza Strip" captures many significant features of Gazan life under occupation: the beach being used as a highway when the Israeli army closes the main road; daily Israeli shooting sprees in Rafah; the damage to the buildings from gunfire; home demolitions; the disastrous economic effects, etc.. In one of the most moving scenes, Longley captures an Israeli missile attack on Gaza city, showing how it feels like from the streets. "Gaza Strip" also captures on tape the victims of a strange Israeli chemical attack. The central feature of the movie, however, is young child roaming the streets selling cakes to make a living, who is not shy of the camera and voluntarily acts as a tour guide of his world. James Longley should be commended for making this fine documentary which deserves the highest of awards. I recommend this to anyone wanting to know what really is happening. This is reporting at its best. Welcome to Gaza, fasten your seatbelts, and thank your God that bullets don't go through the TV screen. For a unique experience of the first day of the Intifada in Jerusalem, I recommend you also get Hazim Bitar's "Jerusalem's High Cost of Living". A similar travelogue from the first Intifada can be found in the unique comic documentary "Palestine" by Joe Sacco.
Rating:
Summary: A simple, powerful, and sorely needed documentary
Review: James Longley's Gaza Strip is a 74-minute documentary filmed between January and April 2001, a period that stretches from four months after the beginning of the Second Palestinian Intifada -- immediately preceding the election of Ariel Sharon as Israel's prime minister -- up to the end of Sharon's third month in office. "I made this film," Longley notes in the director's commentary that accompanies the very highly recommended DVD version, "to satisfy my own curiosity about what was happening in the Gaza Strip since I found that it was very difficult to find information in the mainstream media and get a detailed look at what was going on, what people there were like, what they were thinking about." Longley studied film in the United States and Russia. He was awarded a Student Academy Award for a short 1994 documentary, "Portrait of Boy with Dog," about a boy in a Moscow orphanage. Last year, Longley returned his award in protest following the Academy's prejudice against the Palestinian film Divine Intervention. Gaza Strip centers around another boy, Mohammed Hejazi, a 13-year-old who lives in Gaza City and works as a paper boy. Longley first met Hejazi at the Karni Crossing, an Israeli-controlled border between the northern part of Gaza and Israel proper, the site of regular stone-throwing clashes between Palestinian children and the Israeli military. Typically, 50-60 kids go once a week to throw stones in what is primarily a symbolic gesture due to a murderous geography that places the Israeli checkpoint temptingly out of stone-throwing reach but well within rifle range of the Israeli soldiers stationed there. The casualties among children, confirmed by human rights organisations, have been high, despite no credible threat to the soldiers. Longley had read of these young kids in a New York Times article and sought them out as documentary subjects. "They're not really doing anything effective against the occupation and they know this," says Longley, "but they are resisting it, in their own way." The cheeky Hejazi is not representative of other Palestinian kids his age in that he is a high school dropout whereas Palestinian families typically place a high priority on education. Indeed, Mohammed's elder brother ranked second academically in his age range in all of Gaza and all his other school age siblings were doing very well. But his disassociative outlook on life and the survival humor that he employs to overcome his desperate situation speaks of every one of Gaza's children. All children dream and imagine. In war, children dream of liberating their land and imagine lives outside the oppressive confines of their life. Mohammed is such a dreamer, incredibly articulate for his age. Gaza Strip has no narration in the cinema verite tradition of realism, presenting commentary from Mohammed and others as is, with easy-to-read subtitles for non-Arabic speakers. Time after time in the documentary, Palestinians are given ample space to express their shockingly down-to-earth opinions. Against a background of donkey carts and bogged-down cars struggling along Gaza's beach to circumvent Israeli checkpoints in the ongoing struggle to maintain a normal life -- no matter what -- Longley presents vox pop commentaries from a situationally 'democratic' trudging line of Palestinians from all walks of life, making their way along the shore. Scenes like this are a punch in the stomach, undeniably bringing home the central fact of life under occupation -- it is not only Palestinian militants that the on-the-ground mechanisms of occupation target, but every Palestinian. The common sense apparent in the complaints of all reveals the strong grounding that conflict brings to people that must live in it, as well as a desperately-needed antidote to the impression left by images of Palestinian violence and demonstrations that disproportionately fill our television screens. This same space is given in the aftermath of the death of a child who picked up a disguised explosive device, left behind by an Israeli tank. Similarly, we are forced to confront the unquestionable normality of parents and children in the disturbing medical aftermath of an Israeli deployment of nerve gas against Palestinian civilians. This last point underlines why this documentary meets a critical need. "It was strange to me," says Longley, "that this particular incident never made it out into the mainstream media, especially in the US." On 12 February 2001, following an Israeli attack involving a gas with characteristics clearly different from and much more severe than the ubiquitous teargas, 50 people were brought with severe reactions to Amal and Nasser hospitals in Khan Younis. The following week saw this figure rise to a total of 200 people, still suffering ill effects from the gas, including violent and painful convulsions. Evenly balanced between scenes of individual tragedy and vistas of mass suffering, Gaza Strip is a compelling portrait of human life during wartime, a powerful tool for explaining in simple terms what is wrong with the Israeli or indeed any long term foreign military occupation, and a call for us to pay attention to situations our governments underwrite that generate deserved hostility from our other neighbours on this planet. The documentary works to dispel a number of pervasive myths about the conflict that have rendered Palestinians into 2D in the world's media: that Palestinian parents permit their children to participate in stone throwing or even indeed know of their participation; that all Palestinians stand behind Yasser Arafat; that Israel's use of military force is proportional or even aimed at actual Palestinian combatants; and that the Palestinian people do not want peace with Israelis. All these notions are exposed as patent nonsense in Gaza Strip, where you meet Joe and Jane Palestinian for yourself. There is much more that could be said about this simple but powerful documentary but -- in brief -- this testimony is sorely needed and deserves as wide an audience as possible. Do your part for this excellent independent film. Buy it now and give a copy to everyone you know.
Rating:
Summary: Fantastic
Review: When the movie started, I was expecting a narrator to say something but no, instead direct translation of the palestinian boy was being written underneath the screen. When I watch a movie I may grab glasses to read text at the bottom, but this movie, I felt I had to go back immediately.
The main reason it got 5 stars is that when I saw the movie, I felt I was exploring gaza with this young child. Like in cartoon when characters go into a book, here you walk along the kid in gaza. I haven't seen such a unique presentation. WOW. I wonder if I should lobby for my tax dollars to be spent at home rather than to support occupation on the other end of the globe.
Rating:
Summary: A revealing inside look..
Review: Gaza Strip makes no attempt to investigate the roots of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Rather, it's sole purpose is to portray daily life under one of the longest military occupations in history, mostly through the eyes of several young stone throwing boys. This un-narrarted film lets you hear what these people are saying and feeling, and above all what they really want. But what is does best is let you see for yourself the conditions theses people are forced to live under. Uncensored with several graphic images, this is a documentary film that in all probability won't be televised anytime soon on mainstream media. Because if it was, you'd see what our foreign policy over the decades, has been largely blind to, and what your tax dollars have been supporting through massive aid to Israel.
Rating: 
Summary: The Camera shows everyday life under an occupation boot.
Review: Anyone that has read U.S. newspapers usually reads of "little" Israel struggling to survive the continual Palestinian terrorist attacks. James Longley's camera shows the other side. You will see the horrible desperate hopeless life of the "everyman" in Gaza. It is not surprising that PBS refused to air this film on P.O.V. After all it doesn't fit the stereotypical "mindless terrorist" mantra so commonly parroted by the U.S. mass media. After watching Arab children shot for little reason, houses blown up, men and women indisriminately killed by helecopters and gassed by an omnipotent Israeli army, the term "terrorist" becomes blurred. Is there a significant difference between the killing of innocents by suicide bombers and those killed by Israeli helecopter pilots? After watching the grieving families you decide. You will be stunned by the lack of human rights of the Gaza Arabs . One wonders how long a people should have the experience of an occupation by a foreign power. Thirty five years is a long time to suffer such an injustice. However, if you believe God plays favorites and gave this land only to the Jews and that all outsiders should know their place in the land of Israel, then you will probably object to this movie.
Rating:
Summary: A haunting insight into the lives of Palestinians in Gaza
Review: I saw this documentary at the Vancouver International Film Festival in 2002. I have been interested in learning more about the Middle East conflict and this provided a unique view into the lives of Palestinians living in Gaza. I was stunned at the level of hatred aimed at the Israelis and the incredibly difficult times that these people live under. Like most North Americans I get my news from CNN, BBC World and CBC Newsworld. I have yet to see anything like this documentary coming from any of these news sources. If all I had was CNN, I would believe that all Palestinians were crazed terrorists lining up to martyr themselves. Having seen this documentary, I now have a human perspective and an understanding of what creates the need for martyrs. I would recommend this to anyone wanting to learn more about the Palestinian side of the conflict. On leaving the theatre I could see tears streaming down every face. It left me with the most hollow feeling of despair and anxiety for the all those in the region that desire peace.
Rating:
Summary: radical documentary
Review: You will look long and hard to find a documentary as brutally effective as this one. This is real documentary cinema -- not the scripted BBC stuff you may be used to. When you watch this film, you have a clear sensation of immediacy, that events are taking place around the camera as it rolls. This is a film that is not afraid of anything, not afraid to tell the truth. This film is a bitter indictment of the Israeli occupation, without narration -- only balls-to-the-wall documentary filmmaking. PBS/CNN/CBS, go hide your heads in shame: This is the film you are too cowardly to ever make. Stand aside and let the new generation of documentary makers take over, you lying sissies! Watch 'Gaza Strip' and weep.
Rating:
Summary: Important documentary that everyone should see
Review: I saw this film at a theater in New York and thought it was excellent. This is the first real portrayal of the Palestinian perspective that I have yet seen in the United States. Want to understand the Middle East conflict a bit better? This is one film you must see. Also, it's very well made and has an edgy editing style that I like.
Rating:
Summary: excellent
Review: "Gaza Strip" is an excellent documentary that reveals what life is like for Palestinians living under Israeli occupation, specifically in this tiny strip of land (only 4 miles wide). The filmmaker, James Longley, allows the Palestinians (mostly adolescents) to speak for themselves, for better or for worse. Their comments reveal their collective frustration, sadness, and anger. Those reviewers who gave this film 1 star are being ridiculous - the film does not make any claims to "presenting both sides" or explaining all the complexities of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Contrary to what some have said, it does not claim that the Israelis are using nerve gas or intentionally killing civilians, nor does it try to "hide" the supposed fact that Palestinians want to "kill all non-Muslims (Christians & Jews)" (a ridiculous claim). "Gaza Strip" is a simple portrayal of Palestinian life under the Israeli occupation, and the film eschews scripted narration in favor of just listening to what Palestinian teenagers and others have to say. The viewer is allowed to hear what *they* think and no outside interpretation or meaning is imposed. A final caveat - "Gaza Strip" contains a few extremely gruesome scenes, so remember that before beginning the film.
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