Shooting War: On Witnessing One’s Failure to See (on Time)

Chapter 6 returns to chapter 5’s concern for the question of witnessing, but this time by focusing on the perpetrators of violence. Examining two recent Israeli films, Waltz with Bashir (Ari Folman, 2008) and Lebanon (Samuel Maoz, 2009), this chapter explores their ability to generate an effective ethical and political stance based on a logic of documentation that involves an act of witnessing one’s past failure “to see on time.” If the “crisis of witnessing” addressed in chapter 5 has do with the demand imposed on Palestinians to serve as witnesses of their own suffering, “the crisis of witnessing” examined in chapter 6 has to do with role of the witness assigned to the Israeli soldier as a perpetrator of violence who carries the ethical responsibility of “awakening others.”