hen I film, I feel like the camera protects me. But it’s just an illusion.”

Emad’s story is one of the theft of his land and his freedom. He is father to four children in the village of Bil’in. Others may record time in years but he does it with the childhoods of his four sons and with the changing cameras; each one telling a story.

Born in 1995 around the Oslo Peace Accords, Mohamad got to enjoy the sea every summers. Then came Yasin in 1998; a child in an uncertain time. Taki-Ydin was born on the first day of the Second Intifada in the year 2000 as the dead and wounded lined up the hallways of the same hospitals. Gibreel was born in February 2005 — a child deprived of the sea and snow.

“What I have to film demands a strong camera, not a fragile one.”

Emad’s first camera lasted from the winter to the autumn of 2005. Bought to serve as a storehouse of memories of his youngest son it quickly became a journalism tool in the small village. When it was shot at, his hand was a victim of the assault too. The second camera lasted from the winter of 2006 to the spring of 2007. The third served from winter 2007 to winter 2008 and ended up saving his life as a bullet wedged into it. It was fixed twice before it was shot at by the Israeli army. The fourth camera was part of a truck crash. As it rolled the final clip, Emad’s truck crashed into the fence separating his village from Israeli settlements. Emad was unconscious for 20 days in an Israeli hospital in Tel Aviv. The fifth camera was first smashed by an Israeli soldier, repaired and finally shot again. It survived from winter 2009 to spring 2010. The sixth and final camera has been rolling since the spring of 2010 till date, having survived a stun grenade attack.

Keeping in mind the concepts introduced by Marshall McLuhan, perhaps the best example of the world turning into a global village comes from the stories recorded by photographers and videographers who became journalists not through their own choices but due to the circumstances that altered their normal.

Cameras are used globally to record memories one can fawn over as they sit down to reminisce with a cup of tea. For Emad, what started as a hobby to run around and record his family and loved ones around the village quickly became the album of a video journalist, unknowingly at first. Later, it was a source of evidence.

Today the importance of journalists such as Motaz is felt globally. If one scrolls down on his account far enough, it is evident that he in his early twenties was just a photographer keen to capture the tranquility and peace that his homeland has to offer. The passion for journalism comes when one first picks up a camera and records the world with their own spirit and perspective incorporated into it. The film is a masterpiece in highlighting how an individual’s passion can turn into a hobby and if one puts in the effort even a farmer can become a journalist.

Journalist Plestia’s “For who am I documenting this?” from her Live on Instagram on 13th to Emad’s “I have to believe that capturing these images will have some meaning” in his documentary from 2012, the film comes as a testament to how Palestinians have been documenting the atrocities and illegal occupation for years now, but the world has turned a deaf ear to them. When a child’s first words are “Jesh (army) run, run” you know the world is ignoring journalists.

“Where is Israeli media? Film your soldiers.”

Journalism is a field based on the principle of neutrality but more often than not journalists end up as a mouthpiece for the foreign policies governing the media narrative. It comes as no surprise that the cameras owned by major media houses turn a blind eye when their own sinterests are not being catered to. This is when journalists such as Emad document with their feeble cameras what the proper journalism equipment fails to do so.

One only starts to understand the gravity of the situation when the filming starts to impact the individual’s personal life. From being threatened to be evicted from their house; being forced to watch one’s own brother and neighbours getting arrested without being able to resist it and ask for a fair trial; being a witness to your best friend’s death; watching the man who once had a “childlike grin” lose it — journalists on the frontline not only risk their own lives but also put their loved ones in danger’s path. Wael Dahdouh has perhaps the most harrowing story.

Winner of the 2013 Emmy Award, the documentary 5 Broken Cameras is available on Amazon Prime. While the documentary is analogous in nature — from 2012 to today it is a must watch during the current global scenario. The documentary takes one back in time to say that the ‘war’ didn’t start in October but rather was constantly happening in front of cameras with broken shutters for 75 years — the narratives laced with propaganda, the dehumanisation, the victimisation and the humiliation with no break to even grieve were all there. Recorded by common people like Emad…

The writer is an undergraduate student of psychology at FC College, Lahore