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DONT FEEL BETTER

HASUCHEY MARPE

By Ruth WALK

BLACK SHEEP FILM PRODUCTIONS LTD. - as PROD

Documentary - Post-Production 2017

A Gradual exposure to the phenomenon of Palestinian patients hospitalized in Israel, and its price.
An investigation of the allegedly silent financial collaboration between the Palestinian Authority and Israel on the account of Palestinians in need of urgent medical treatment.

- Year of production
- 2017
- Genres
- Documentary
- Countries
- ISRAEL
- Budget
- 0.3 - 0.6 M$
- Director(s)
- Ruth WALK
- Writer(s)
- Naomi LEVARI, Saar YOGEV, Ruth WALK
- Producer(s)
- Saar YOGEV (Black Sheep Film Productions), Naomi LEVARI (Black Sheep Film Productions)
- Synopsis
- Since the establishment of the Oslo agreements in 1994, Palestinian patients with difficult medical cases are directed to treatment in Israeli Hospitals due to lack of proper medical solutions in the Palestinian territories. This is a long and complex procedure that demands multiple permits from the health department in the Palestinian Authority and the Ministry of Security in Israel. At any given moment there are thousands of Palestinian patients in Israeli hospitals.
  Yasmin, 32, an Arab Israeli national, has been a head nurse at the Israeli Hospital Hadassah Ein Kerem’s pediatric ward for the last nine years. Realizing Palestinian patients had no one to turn to but her, Yasmin became their voice and ears, and has quite often been tending to the patients’ needs when off-duty, outside the ward.
  Yasmin’s mobile phone and the many contacts she has made have saved lives on more than one occasion. Two years ago Yasmin received support from an unexpected source; Ya’akub, an Arab Israeli lawyer from Abu Gosh, established a non-profit organization to raise funds for food supply and basic help to “incarcerated” family members. Having witnessed the complexity and scale of the phenomenon, Ya’akub and his colleagues Abir, Rima and Haneen, found themselves spending hours trying to break through the never-ending Israeli and Palestinian bureaucracy, in order to help patients obtain the desired “health” and “security” permits. They have been in a constant race against time, facing the Palestinian Authority and the Israeli Ministry of Defense, lest another dying patient misses his/her last chance.
  But what lies at the base of this quiet cooperation between Israel and the PA? Why has the Palestinian Authority been avoiding building new hospitals to reduce reliance on Israel and where does it channel the aid money from the European Union? Why does Israel keep these patients in its hospitals for as long as possible?
  Through interviews strictly-orchestrated, in the official settings of functionaries from the various establishments, i.e. MR. Hanni Abadin the Palestinian minister of health Mr. Osama Najar – Head of the PA Health Association who is in charge of the PA permits, Ms. Dalia Bessa of the Israeli ministry of Defense who is in charge of Security permits, , , Dr. Yuval Weiss the Deputy Director of the Israeli Ein Karem Hospital in charge of “Health Tourism” which ironically includes the Palestinian patients , Dr. Ruchama Marton of Physicians for Human Rights an NGO active in Israel and Palestine, Ms. Cathrine Ashton the EU Foreign Affairs Chief. , the District Coordination and Liaison etc. We shall join and follow the different motivations of the parties involved for perpetuating this situation. This Rashomon, shall take shape as an all-encompassing puzzle, interlaced and woven with unmediated human stories documented in the hospital.
  Don’t Feel Better shall lay bare the nature of a controversial connection between Israel and the Palestinians on the account of those trapped in the security-financial bureaucratic maze, in their desperate struggle to receive life-saving treatments.
- Partners & financing
- Kan
  Rabinovitch Film Fund
  Channel 8 - development Grant
- Beginning of shooting
- Apr 16, 2017
- End of shooting
- Sep 03, 2017