Photo of the Year, by Natan Dvir

Natan Dvir’s photo (I’ve blogged about him before) was chosen Photo of the Year at the Local Testimony photo exhibition. The image below was selected by a panel of 9 judges, from over 5,000 entries.

Local Testimony exhibits the best of local photojournalism, together with the World Press Photo exhibition. The exhibition will be open from until January 12 at the Dizengoff Center in Tel Aviv (Building A, 3rd floor, next to the Kravitz shop). For further information, plus an online photo gallery, see the Local Testimony website.

This is how Natan describes his image:

“Na’im El’iam (36), a Palestinian resident of the Jabalyah Refugee Camp in Gaza, holds the body of his three-month-old son Muhammad. The body is wrapped in blue cloth. On orders of the security forces, Na’im is standing in the parking lot near Erez Checkpoint, which is closed to traffic due to violent confrontations between Hamas and Fatah in Gaza. Na’im El’iam was trying to get home in order to bury his son, who died of a congenital heart defect in Israel’s Tel Hashomer Hospital, after doctors tried to save his life. The Palestinian father arrived at Erez Checkpoint, the main border crossing between Israel and Gaza, just as it was getting dark - a few minutes after a shooting incident between Hamas fighters and Fatah members who were hiding inside the checkpoint. After waiting for the shooting to end and then for his documents and permits to be checked, Na’im El’iam was permitted to cross the checkpoint to the Palestinian side with his son’s body.”

Click here to see a larger version of the photo.

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This entry was written by Lisa Goldman and posted on December 15, 2007 at 11:26 pm and filed under Uncategorized. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post. Post a comment(Latest is displayed first) or leave a trackback: Trackback URL.

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6 Comments so far (Add 1 more)

surreal and yet tragically real

1. lirun
on December 16th, 2007 at 1:15 am
Poignant and arresting. When we went to the WPP exposition on Thursday, we stood in front of this photo for a long time. (But I think the caption on the photo at WPP is somewhat different than what Dvir says on flickr.)

BTW-the exhibition is on the same level, but now next to Kravitz. It moved from where it was last year.

2. Jennifer
on December 16th, 2007 at 11:40 am
Hi Jen -

Natan sent out a group email with the photo and his lengthy description in Hebrew, so I just translated it. I guess the exhibit organizers wanted him to keep it short and…poignant.

Many thanks for correcting me on the location. I haven’t been to the exhibit yet, but plan to go later this week. Last year’s was stunning, but so sad. All those photos from the war…

3. lisagoldman
on December 16th, 2007 at 11:48 am
Having just visited Israel, I’ve been bitterly complaining to my acquaintances about my treatment by ’security’ at the border. I think I’ll just shut-up now. Thanks so much Lisa for drawing our attention to this amazing shot, and the circumstances surrounding it.

4. Wahine Toa
on December 17th, 2007 at 1:57 am
Thank you for bringing to this readers’ attention (as you do with so many subjects and points of view), this all-important Local Testimony project.

5. tamar
on December 17th, 2007 at 10:42 pm
Wow! The things you have to do in this world! Tugs at the heart…

6. Semper gumby
on December 18th, 2007 at 4:05 am

One Trackback

By Natan Dvir’s Photo of the Year - OneJerusalem.com Israel's News Blog Magazine on December 20, 2007 at 1:22 pm

[...] read this great post on Lisa Goldman’s blog and as always it made me stop and think. I had to outright steal it and bring it here, hope she [...]