Finding Common Ground in an Uncommon Nation
Marla Mossman
RAND researchers Cheryl Benard and Ed O’Connell have been to the far points of the Muslim world as a part of developing the think tank’s Alternative Strategy Initiative, which addresses the effects of extremism and sectarianism on those too often are hiding in plain sight: youth, women and refugees. But after a recent trip to Syria where they found themselves happening one night upon an unsettling and perception-busting TV program, they went back there to find out how a director in a country known for defending terrorism could produce “entertainment” that portrayed quite the opposite. They tell Malibu Magazine their story.
With practiced efficiency, the young man is strapping something onto the young girl. She is 5 or 6 years old, and as he tugs at her braid to avoid snagging her hair on the harness, viewers will at first think that he is helping her with her backpack to get her ready for school. But as the camera pans back, viewers hear the sound of a woman weeping and protesting in the background, and come to realize that the young man is a terrorist, that the thing he is putting on the child is a vest with suicide explosives and that what he is preparing her for is bloody oblivion.
Coming upon this scene quite by accident as we flipped idly through the channels of Arab satellite TV, during a trip to the Middle East, we were captivated by its sheer dramatic power, shocked to learn that it was based on a true event and completely amazed to hear that its producer was, of all things, a Syrian. In conventional U.S. perception, Syria is an autocratic state where artists and filmmakers cannot function or flourish. Furthermore, as a member of the “Axis of Evil,” even if it did have any filmmakers, they would be defending terrorism, not condemning it.
“We” are Cheryl Benard and Ed O’Connell, and we are researchers with the RAND Corporation, a nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization with headquarters in Santa Monica. RAND’s commitment to objective and rigorous research rests on a relentless search for the facts. Our president and chief executive officer Jim Thomson often alludes to Dragnet’s Sgt. Joe Friday with his deadpan, “Just the facts, ma’am.” In that spirit, we have spent the last six years since 9/11, crisscrossing the Muslim world from Mostar to Bosnia to Khiyam in Southern Lebanon to Iraq and to Afghanistan.
Ed O’Connell
Upon landing, we are immediately whisked into the airport’s VIP lounge and offered tea. The hostesses are gracious, but our passports are gone and our fellow travelers are elsewhere, and we find ourselves speaking in muffled tones as we try to determine why we have been singled out for special treatment. The answer, as we will soon discover, lies in the identity of our host: Najdat Anzour, it turns out, is not just any filmmaker. He is the Syrian equivalent of Fellini and Bertolucci all rolled into one elegant, debonair package. In Syria, he is a star, and by association, it seems, so are we.
Our passports are eventually returned to us without incident, and we are handed over to “Mr. Hammed” and “Mr. Ahmed” (pronounced Ak-med) — assistants to Anzour. Hammed flips open his cell phone to show us the photo of a very attractive blonde woman while insistently repeating, “Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara.” After a few minutes, we are able to make out that his daughter and grandchild live in the United States.
The Cham Palace in downtown Damascus — our home for the next week — somewhat dims our good mood. The cavernous lobby, defective neon lighting and sulky employees make you feel that you have somehow landed yourself in the Soviet Union of the 1980s. Furthermore, the hotel has the dubious distinction of allegedly having been the meeting place of al-Qaeda operatives and Iraqi insurgents back in 2003. But we don’t have too much time to reflect on that, as Hammed and Ahmed have instructions to deliver us to Anzour.
The Art House, in the upscale Mezzeh neighborhood of Damascus, is a lovingly restored former mill that now serves as a boutique hotel, spa, art gallery, restaurant and hangout for the city’s intelligentsia. Architect Ghiath Machnok, gives us an extended warm and sincere welcome and a tour of the premises. As we walk through the rooms admiring the antique Syrian furniture and the carved doorways, and plotting our escape from the Cham Hotel to this much more congenial location, a photo catches our eye. The man in the picture is Mustafa Akkad. Our new friend tells us he was a Syrian film producer. He and his daughter were killed in the terrorist bomb blast at the SAS Radisson Hotel in Amman, Jordan, in November of 2005. His voice shaking with emotion, Machnok tells us that Akkad had been one of his best friends. Upon hearing that Ed had been at the site of the second hotel bombed in the same attack and had narrowly escaped being killed, Machnok stops in his tracks and mutters, “Alhamdulillah” roughly translated as “thank God” in Arabic.
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