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The Power of Film to Tell a Story
Last night I watched “Screams Before Silence,” a 60-minute documentary film that focuses on the sexual atrocities committed by Hamas terrorists during the October 7th attacks on Israeli towns and at the Nova Music Festival. My bad. This is not a movie to watch before bed. Although the producers have made a conscious choice not to show intimate body parts, the all-around depiction of what happened to women at the hands of Hamas is easy enough to imagine when you hear the former hostages speak.
The idea for the documentary was conceived following the October 7th attacks, which involved brutal acts of gender-based violence, including rape, assault, and mutilation of women and girls.
Narrated by Sheryl Sandberg, who interviewed all the surviving women, it was made by an Israeli production company.
Sandberg, the former COO of Meta and founder of LeanIn.org, became an outspoken advocate on this issue from the get-go because she had championed womens’ issues in the past. As a Jew and a wealthy woman, she was able to write an op-ed in November and speak at the United Nations in December. She also met with government leaders in the U.K., France, and Germany to call for an investigation into these crimes as crimes against humanity.
You might say she had the bully pulpit, so when some philanthropists decided to fund the film, they got in touch with her and she agreed to go to Israel immediately and start filming.