The Stories
Beata & Emmanuel
Beata Mukangarambe & Emmanuel Bamporiki
Beata’s five children were killed during the genocide in Rwanda. For years, she remained in the neighborhood where her children had died, until a man who participated in killing her children returned to his neighboring home. Emmanuel relentlessly confronted her with his crime, begging her to forgive him. “Do you deserve to be forgiven,” she asks, “or do you deserve to die?” As Emmanuel seeks her forgiveness, hoping to learn how to live with himself again, Beata must decide if the path of forgiveness will aid in her own recovery and allow her to move on.
Bassam & Rami
Bassam Aramin & Rami Elhanan
An Israeli soldier killed Bassam’s daughter; a Palestinian bomber killed Rami’s daughter. The two grieving fathers met when they sought help at Parents Circle-Families Forum, a group that aids Palestinians and Israelis who have lost loved ones in the conflict. “I saw people who paid the highest price possible, who chose the way of dialogue instead of hatred,” Rami remembers. “…I’m ashamed to say, I was 47 years old at the time. It was the first time ever in my life that I met Palestinians as human beings, as people who carry the same burden that I do, as people who suffer exactly the same way. I was completely shocked. …I discovered people like Bassam Aramin, who is, for me, more than a brother today. And the old Rami could never have met him.” In the film, Bassam – the co-founder of Combatants for Peace – and Rami share how the deaths of their daughters changed their lives.
Robi
Robi Damelin
Robi’s son David was a peace activist and student at Tel Aviv University before he was conscripted into the Israeli Defense Force. He was shot and killed by a sniper while stationed at a roadside checkpoint. Robi now works as a spokesperson with the The Parents Circle-Families Forum, a group that helps Palestinians and Israelis who have lost loved ones in the conflict. “It’s strange,” she recalls, “because when the army had come to tell me that David had been killed, the first, apparently, thing I had said is, ‘You may not kill anybody in the name of my child.’” In Beyond Right & Wrong, Robi discusses the letter she sent to the sniper’s family and his public response justifying the murder of David and nine others.
Richard
Richard Moore
When Richard was ten years old, a British Soldier shot him with a rubber bullet. The bullet struck the bridge of his nose, leading to the loss of his right eye and blindness in his left. He would never see again. He discovered the name of the soldier 33 years later and wrote a letter to arrange a meeting. “The first day that I found out his name, everything changed. It wasn’t a soldier then. It was Charles. …It was a human being in a sense. And that sort of distance… was brought a bit closer by saying ‘Charles.’”
Jo & Pat
Jo Berry & Pat Magee
On 12 October 1984, Jo Berry awoke to the news of a bomb detonation in the hotel where her father was staying. Sir Anthony Berry, a Conservative Party MP, was one of five people killed in the bombing at the Grand hotel in Brighton, England. The bomber, Patrick Magee of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA), received eight life sentences. After serving 14 years, Pat was released under the terms of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement. Jo struggled with her anger at his release: “How dare anybody think their need to be heard is so important that they killed my father.” This anger eventually led her to contact Pat, hoping to get some clarity on why he had killed her father. Through their first conversation and the many that follow, Jo and Pat learn to understand and respect each other as people rather than enemies.
Jean-Baptiste
Jean-Baptiste Ntakirutimana
Jean-Baptiste survived the genocide in Rwanda, emerging to find that his immediate family, including 11 brothers, were gone. He struggled to recover from the trauma, suffering nightmares of his mother’s murder. Unable to learn the details of his family’s death, he imagined the worst. After living with the pain for several years, Jean-Baptiste decided to seek out and face the man who killed his mother. “He was in prison, but I was his prisoner,” he says. In Beyond Right & Wrong, Jean-Baptiste shares his journey to recovery and his effort to finally learn the truth about his mother’s murder.
