Street Shadows (2015)

Na've Sha'anan (English: 'A Peaceful Habitation'), a street in southern Tel Aviv, has gone through a great deal of turmoil and neglect over the years as it is being constantly abused. Planned and built in 1921 to house Jewish refugees forced to flee the Arab riots in Jaffa, people have ever since come and gone in droves: Holocaust survivors, Jews from Iran following the downfall of the Shah, Jewish refugees from Syria, and foreign workers from Asia, Romania and Turkey. In 2011, nearly 60,000 Africans from Eritrea and Sudan have made this street and the neighborhood their home. This is a film with no clear heroes though it is laden with heroism in the ensuing war of survival for those who have chosen to make the street their home or who have been forced to. Armed with a camera and aiming at eye level, I have set out to tell the story of this street from the point of view of those for whom the street was, is, and has become a safe haven in their broken lives.