Two Films of Interest

The film "Mother V, A Story About Loyalty", a drama focusing on the image of Mordechai Vanunu's mother, will be shown on Israel's Channel 2 on Sunday, November 11, at 10 PM. Shachar Rozen's film features Levana Finkelstein, who won the Best Actress Award at the Jerusalem Film Festival; the film also won Best Drama Award.

The documentary film "The Bomb in the Basement" that was shown last week on Channel 2 has already led to some public debate on the issue of Israel's nuclear arsenal. A commentary in Yediot Ahronot argued that although no law has been changed, Shimon Peres simply decided that it was time to boast about his major role in establishing Israel's "nuclear option". Therefore, why should Vanunu still be imprisoned?

On the whole, the film "the Bomb in the Basement" added no new information and a large part of it focused on obscure political maneouvers within the Labor governments of the sixties. The name of Mordechai Vanunu was not mentioned.

The highlight of the film was the part in which Shimon Peres described being called back urgently from Senegal and flown by helicopter, along with the head of the Mossad, Issar Harel, to discuss with Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion the immediate danger that the USA was about to discover the secret nuclear plant in Dimona. Harel commented: "I never rode in a helicopter. I'm old, but my memory is very good. That sounds like one of Peres' tall tales."

-Rayna Moss