The Voice of Hind Rajab Parent Guide

Being an emergency dispatcher is highly stressful, requiring steadiness under pressure while triaging calls for police, firefighters, and ambulance. Just imagine how much worse that job is in a war zone.

Omar (Motaz Malhees) is an emergency dispatcher with the Palestine Red Crescent Emergency Call Center in Ramallah, which is located on the West Bank. Since the war in Gaza shuttered their office, emergency calls from Gaza are being fielded in Ramallah, which is 50 miles (80 kilometers) away. Even routine calls from Gaza are a minefield of complexity – and then Omar receives a call that’s far from routine.

The woman’s voice on the phone is anxious and afraid as she asks for help but she begins screaming when gunfire is heard. Then silence. When Omar calls back, the phone is answered by a very young child, a six-year-old girl who says her name is Hanood, a nickname for Hind Rajab Hamada. As guns sporadically fire in the background and tanks roll, Omar and his colleague, Rana (Saja Kilani) do their best to calm the child and keep her talking while their boss, Mahdi (Amar Hlehel) tries to obtain approvals from the Red Cross and the Israeli Defense Forces so he can send an ambulance to rescue the terrified child.

Unsurprisingly, this is a gut-clencher of a film. It’s agonizing to hear the voice of a terrified child, as adults keep reassuring her that they are trying to “coordinate” her rescue. What makes this more difficult to hear is the knowledge that the tapes of Hanood’s voice are real: this movie uses the recorded conversations between Hanood and the Red Crescent dispatchers throughout the film’s runtime. These voices give the production a greater level of intensity, tension, and horror as viewers realize that they are listening to a real child going through a ghastly experience.

It’s not just the child who suffers. Omar, Rana, Mahdi, and the office psychologist, Nisreen (Clara Khoury), all experience excruciating stress, fear, helplessness, and rage as they battle a broken system to rescue an innocent child. Psychologists refer to experiences such as this as “moral injury” –  damage done to someone’s conscience when they witness or fail to prevent acts that violate their moral beliefs. This film is the embodiment of moral injury.

I found The Voice of Hind Rajab both moving and effective, but I’m not certain who its target audience is going to be. Anyone who is interested in the Gaza conflict will likely want to watch the film but it’s too emotionally gut-wrenching for mass audiences. The film is well made, tense, and blessed with a good cast but few of us want to listen to a real child begging to be rescued from a car full of corpses. I’m not saying that you should shun the film: just don’t expect it to be popcorn entertainment. (And don’t take the kids!)

About author

Kirsten Hawkes

Kirsten Hawkes has a BA in Political Science and English and has worked in international development and medical education and marketing. Kirsten enjoys reading, watching movies, and debating politics with her husband and sometimes unwilling children.