Imagine that you are flying several meters above the ground, feeling only feel the breeze and the sound of the wind. Suddenly you land, to find rubble, traces of destruction, and a bitter reality whose consequences continue to this day. Yet those few moments are what give hope to the youth of Gaza for a better tomorrow. Is there a magic recipe for living those moments? The secret lies in “Yalla Parkour.”
This year, director Areeb Zuaiter represents the Palestinian presence at the 75th Berlinale, with her documentary “Yalla Parkour,” which is being screened in the Panorama competition. It tells the story of a team member in Gaza who masters parkour, the sport of jumping between high surfaces. I interviewed Areeb about the film and her participation at the Berlinale.The events of the film begin in 2015. How did you get to know the “Gaza Parkour” team back then?
In 2014, Israel waged a 50-day war against Gaza. I had just given birth to my daughter, a month earlier. I was following the news and wondering why I had brought a child into this world. I discovered a group of young people who were dealing with the situation with determination, through the sport of parkour of which I knew nothing. I contacted them on social media, and Ahmed, who was in charge of their page, responded. We stayed in touch for several months, until the idea of the documentary had fermented in my mind. I suggested it to them, and we began a journey that has lasted for nearly ten years.
What caught my attention was that Ahmed defined himself from the beginning as a filmmaker first and foremost, then an athlete. Did he catch your eye from the start as a potential partner for the journey?
What surprised me was his relationship with photography. Ahmed believed that photography was the ticket that would get him out of Gaza. But this posed a challenge for the film, as the way he filmed was all about highlighting athletic movements, which gave it the overtones of an advertising campaign that don’t fit a narrative project. He sent me a hard drive full of videos, which helped me learn more about Gaza, but I realised that I needed a more experienced cameraman. So Ibrahim Al-Otla joined us. He helped us a lot with his diligence and the way he understood my observations about the visual identity I wanted for the film.
When did you decide that Ahmed would be the hero of your film?
When he left for Sweden, I felt that I had a clear character with a complete dramatic trajectory. I went there immediately to meet him and start filming his new life. I was totally focusing on his attempts to integrate into Swedish society, but then I realised that this didn’t fit the subject of the film, so I decided to go back and focus on the period when he was doing sport in Gaza.
In the film, we rediscover parkour as a sport with its own special charm, linked to geography and architecture, and to the ideas of overcoming obstacles, of falling and getting injured and then getting up and starting over, and even using the rubble as a space for creativity, as the young people do in the wreckage of Gaza airport. Was this the vision in your mind?
That’s exactly right. Look at how they interact with the bombed airport and the demolished mall. Their actions say: these places have become rubble, but they belong to us. When you see them walking on the airport’s walls and jumping between them, you feel they’re making a practical statement that they own the place. The nature of the sport means they approach danger with a comfort that most people don’t have—comfort mixed with a bit of nihilism. On the one hand, they are challenging their situation, but on the other, they know inside themselves that they could be killed by a shell at any moment. That said, parkour is their only way to feel free. Abdullah Al-Qassab, a member of the team, told me in an interview: “When I’m jumping, I feel happy and completely free, and when my feet touch the ground, I remember the difficult situation.” In scenes after Ahmed immigrates to Sweden, we see him practicing sports safely, but the sense of enjoyment he had in Gaza seems to fade away. Do you agree with that?
This is the magical aspect of the subject. It’s a combination of place and action; you can’t have one side without the other. We filmed lots of scenes of Ahmed after he emigrated, doing sport in Sweden, and even his efforts to establish a Parkour school in Gaza. But I got bored watching this young man practice sport safely, in a dedicated venue. Practicing the same sport in a place full of rubble, barriers and prohibitions like Gaza gives it deeper meanings.
When did you decide that you yourself would be a character in the film, and that we would follow the story of your family’s move to the United States?
The idea came very late, after the outbreak of the last war in Gaza. When I was applying for support for the film, I wrote in my personal statement about my relationship with Gaza and my motivations for making the film. After this humanitarian catastrophe, I started constantly remembering my mother and her extended relationship with Gaza, and how she used to follow the news and be hugely affected by it. Her presence in my mind convinced me that this strand should play an important role in the film.
That strand also completes Ahmed’s journey. He has moved to a safe, developed country, but something is missing inside him, just like with your family.
There is definitely something missing. When I first moved to the United States, I had some enthusiasm for starting a new life in a beautiful place. The same thing happened with my parents, whose journey was very similar to Ahmed’s. I’ve never lived in the West Bank, but my parents lived there and were forced to leave it, and I always feel this absence inside them. The same thing happened with Ahmed, who spent seven years trapped in Sweden as he waited to get his citizenship. As soon as he got it, he went back to visit Gaza, and he meant to make his visit an annual habit, like praying, but what has happened over the last two years has prevented him from achieving that dream. Immigration freed us from the restrictions imposed on us in our country, but these new places are not our country, and our feelings towards them will remain strange, no matter what happens.
Is there anything you would like to add?
I would just like to draw viewers’ attention to the fact that these could be last images we saw of Gaza before the brutal attack, which would make it a completely different place. I invite them to see a place full of inhumane actions. The crisis in Gaza did not start on October 7th. The most basic human right is to feel comfortable and safe in your home and country, a right the people of Gaza have not had for over 75 years.
February 2025