The ongoing genocide in Gaza is not the first in human history, but it is undeniably the first in the modern era to be broadcast in real time. It plays out on news bulletins, circulates through phone screens, and is watched by millions—yet still, it remains misunderstood.
When the war on Gaza began in October 2023, even the most pessimistic voices didn’t imagine it would stretch beyond two years. Massacres have targeted civilians, striking schools, hospitals, homes, and even tents meant to shelter the displaced. At a time when everything seemed normal except for death, Palestinian filmmaker Rashid Masharawi chose to act in the way he knows best: by making a film.
But this time, he didn’t hold the camera himself. Instead, he launched a remote project that brought together 22 short films, each directed by young men and women in Gaza. These works emerged from within the destruction, from zero distance. They document not only what was seen, but what was felt and imagined amid ongoing bombardment. With his technical expertise and network in the cinematic world, Masharawi helped assemble this powerful archive under near-impossible conditions inside the besieged strip.
Each film in From Ground Zero carries its own tone and visual language, but all are bound by a shared trauma that cannot be ignored. There is no music; only the hum of drones that never leave Gaza’s sky. There are no clean endings; only open wounds. These are not polished films with slogans, but raw accounts of life under siege.
From Ground Zero doesn’t present Gaza from the outside. It brings us inside. It shows us what international media cannot reach—what only a Gazan camera, held at arm’s length, can truly capture.
As a viewer, you become part of the experience. Forget the headlines and the social media clips. Sitting in a theater seat, you may cry, laugh, or feel the urge to scream. What you see will not resemble anything you’ve seen before. The muffled voices of Gazans, their dead who are no longer just numbers scrolling across a ticker, their struggle to live through, or with, the unimaginable. Their dreams vanish before your eyes—and theirs.
In 24 Hours by Alaa Damo, we follow Musab as he survives three airstrikes, each in a place labeled “safe.” Every time, he emerges from the rubble. You might find yourself thinking: what did your last 24 hours look like?
In Soft Skin by Khamis Masharawi, you’ll remember those online posts about mothers writing their children’s names on their arms so they could be identified—alive or dead. But here, you don’t just read it. You see it on the children’s faces. Can you imagine a child going to sleep knowing the name written on their arm is their only way to be recognized if a missile hits? Masharawi’s camera doesn’t explain. It listens. It lets the silence speak.
In Recycling by Rabab Khamis, no slogans are raised. This isn’t an environmental message—it is survival under fire. You may speak of “sustainability,” “waste reduction,” or “water conservation,” but she lives these concepts. Not out of choice, but because she has no other option. As you watch a woman carry on in a bombed-out home, without water, cleaning supplies, or food, you may find your hand reaching for the water bottle beside you. You drink, trying to process what you’ve just witnessed.
What we see on TV is not what people in Gaza live through. That is the stark truth the film leaves you with.
From Ground Zero achieves something news coverage cannot. Not because the images are more dramatic, but because the storytellers are the ones living the story. The people filming are those who’ve lost. The ones narrating are simply trying to survive.
If tears come while watching, drink your water and keep talking about them. They are still there—in water lines, fleeing airstrikes, searching for something called “safety,” sleeping under Kareem’s blanket that doubles as a burial shroud, surviving through the effort of a donkey named Wanisa who carries people across Gaza despite hunger, exhaustion, and the loss of her owner.
This is not just a documentary. It is a form of resistance. A collective testimony about what it means to remain alive while everything around you is being stripped away. Once you’ve seen Gaza film itself, you will never be able to see it the same way again.
