IN January, 10 years ago, the ground invasion stage of Israel’s 2008-2009 assault on Gaza began. As with much else during what is known as Operation Cast Lead, the Israeli army exploited its massive military advantage to the full.

Palestinians in Gaza paid a devastating price. More than 1,400 people were killed in Gaza during the attack.

Among them, few suffered more than the Samouni family. Twenty-three members of the extended family were killed in two separate incidents on January 4 and 5, 2009. Twenty-one of those perished in a missile strike on a house they had been ordered into by Israeli soldiers on the ground. The UN subsequently deemed the killing of the Samounis to be war crimes.

The Samouni story is the subject of an Italian documentary by filmmaker Stefano Savona.

Samouni Road won international recognition at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival, where it garnered the L’Œil d’or prize for best documentary. For Palestinians it has special resonance.

As the audience watched and cried, the sounds and images of war – the bombs and sirens, the pictures and footage of the dead and wounded – came, reviving the state of fear and anxiety the people experienced.

The film’s sequence of events follows the narrative told by survivors of the Samouni family.

The key scene is the first. Here, Amal Samouni, a young girl who was injured and lost her father and brother during the attack, tells the director, in response to a question about what happened, that she doesn’t know how to tell a story. Innovative and touching, Samouni Road has reached beyond the usual crowd of exiled Palestinians and Arabs and human rights activists.

It avoids rendering Palestinians solely as victims and brings Gaza to life through interviews and the use of animation in a manner rarely seen.

The simple words of ordinary people from Gaza are also extremely powerful. What better way to talk to international audiences than to do so directly?

B McKenna,

Overtoun Avenue,

Dumbarton.