Beetz Brothers, a well-established German production company, has teamed with ZDF to produce “Hurt People Hurt People, October 7 and its Aftermath,” a feature-length documentary exploring the repercussions of the Hamas attack in Israel and the ongoing cycle of violence in the Middle East.
“Hurt People Hurt People” reteams Beetz Brothers, which is part of Mediawan-owned Leonine Studios, with Israeli producer and filmmaker Duki Dror at Zygote Films. The two company previously produced together “Supernova: The Music Festival Massacre” which chronicled the massacre at a music festival in Southern Israel where 365 attendees were killed, hundreds wounded and 40 kidnapped into Gaza. The doc is currently broadcast in over 50 countries around the world and has played at festivals in the U.S., Canada and Europe.
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The new documentary, timed to mark the one-year commemoration of the Hamas massacre and the onset of the war in Gaza on Oct. 7 2023, is directed by Jens Strohschnieder and Mathias Marx from Germany and Dror from Israel. The 90-minute film combines eyewitness reports from Israel and Gaza with the expertise of leading trauma specialists, as well as Middle East experts. “Hurt People Hurt People” shows how Israel’s full-scale war aimed at destroying Hamas in Gaza has triggered a deep Palestinian trauma — the expulsion of 1948.
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“Ignorance is the companion of nationalism and excessive patriotism,” said Reinhardt Beetz, producer at Beetz Brothers. “The immediacy of images, their supposed authenticity, floods public perception with fabricated realities. The horrific Hamas terrorist attack on October 7 was a history-altering event.”
“One year later, we are only beginning to recognize its global impacts,” said Beetz. “For Israelis and Palestinians, it opened Pandora’s box, deeply embedded in their collective memory.” He said the “ongoing cruel war foreshadows a bleak future, marked by a lack of reconciliation and empathy, driven by fear, hatred, and survival instincts.”
While filming in the Middle East, Strohschnieder said he “felt as though a black veil had descended over the land” in Israel, creating two separated worlds. “The mood in the West Bank was as depressingly similar as in Israel,” he said.
Back in Europe, the war in Gaza has also been hotly debated, sparking occasionally anti-Semitic and anti-Muslim riots.
Dror said “viewing October 7 through the lens of trauma allows us to move beyond the binary and divisive political discourse that usually leads nowhere.”
“For us, this is the first step in creating a narrative that both sides can reflect on, recognizing the tragic spiral they are locked in,” said Dror.
“Hurt People Hurt People” will premiere worldwide on Deutsche Welle channels beginning of October, following the European premiere on French-German network Arte on Sept. 24. Deutsche Welle holds the worldwide distribution rights fo “Hurt People Hurt People.” The film is produced by Beetz brothers with Zygote Films, in co-production with ZDF, in collaboration with Arte and Deutschen Welle.
Photos from the documentary:
