In “Ahmad Alive”, a young reporter tells a harrowing personal account of a nation's resilience under constant fire.
- 2 days ago
- 4 min read
Written by Riley Hlatshwayo
Ahmad Ghunaim’s documentary short is an incredibly searing and essential contribution to the growing zeitgeist of films and commentary coming out of Palestine in the wake of the world’s renewed attention to the region following October 7th, 2023. Although Palestinians have lived under Israeli occupation for over half a century, this period marked an alarming intensification of violence, with abductions and mass killings carried out under the guise of what mainstream media has termed the Hamas-Israeli conflict. Through his lens, Ghunaim beckons the viewers to witness these realities firsthand and confront them for what they are: acts of genocide.
Ahmad Alive, co-produced by Yusuf Omar and Aurelia Driver of Seen.TV, opens up with a brief historical overview, offering context for how its subject, Ahmad Ghunaim, arrived at the point we meet him in the documentary. Through voice-overs and past footage from his socials, Ghunaim reflects on his aspirations of becoming a travel vlogger—someone who would showcase Gaza’s beauty to the world and inspire Palestinians to explore beyond its borders. However, these dreams were stifled by severe travel restrictions. Instead, he decided to turn his camera inward, documenting the hidden gems of Gaza despite the constant weight of oppression—this became a quiet act of resistance and a testament to the resilience of not only a people but of ambitions constantly stifled by struggle.
In an interview with EWN, Ghunaim shared that he ‘never intended to be a war correspondent,’ but felt compelled to show the world the reality in Gaza after October 7th. It was after his house was bombed and his community uprooted through numerous Israeli attacks that Ghunaim sought to shift his gaze and take up a more journalistic approach to bear witness to the horrors unfolding around him. This coincided with the ban on foreign journalism and broadcasting.
The significance of Ghunaim and Omar’s use of mobile journalism cannot be overstated. It raises profound questions about the role of the individual, and the artist, in documenting their own annihilation. What does it mean to step back from experiencing trauma in real time to record it and raise awareness? To take on the burden of archiving an atrocious history, of bearing witness to the horror with honesty and intention? From what is filmed to what is left on the cutting room floor during editing, every decision becomes a moral one.
By preserving the raw integrity of Ghunaim’s footage, including the uneasy visual tension created by the mismatch between a phone’s vertical frame and a cinema screen’s horizontal format, the film invites viewers to feel the physical and psychological confines of life in Gaza. That stylistic discomfort becomes a metaphor: the letterboxed frame mirrors the claustrophobia of war, the darkness engulfing us from all sides, and yet within it, a sliver of light, a story, survives. The people of Gaza persist.
Ahmad Alive, in portraying a nation’s resistance amidst horror, also highlights the dangers faced by filmmakers and journalists in the region. While foreign media were banned, the mass assassination of local reporters became rampant. Ghunaim accounts for the time he received news of Ayat Al-Khadour’s death. Shortly after she posted a video detailing how Israel’s aircraft were using internationally banned phosphorus bombs in residential areas in Gaza, the freelance journalist and podcaster was killed during a targeted raid in her family’s home. Throughout this segment, seeing the sombre mood elevating from Ghunaim’s grief and despondency, I wondered: Is Ahmad alive right now? For a viewer who was previously unaware of Ahmad Ghunaim before the documentary, such questions arise, considering the culture Israel has of killing Palestinian journalists and media personnel. It was also exacerbated by the young correspondent’s growing health issues.
It is here that South Africa’s status as an ally to Palestine is raised. Through footage from news outlets, the documentary reminds us of the country’s bold stand to accuse Israel of war crimes like apartheid, genocide, and ethnic cleansing at the International Court of Justice. Ghunaim returns to the camera, directly speaking about South Africa’s bravery to do what the rest of the world has failed to, and expresses his desire to go there.
Selected for the 27th edition of the Encounters South African International Documentary Festival that took place in Johannesburg and Cape Town, the Seen.TV documentary added significantly to the programme’s core themes that called for films that ‘speak, stir, and stand tall.’ Ahmad Ghunaim and Yusuf Omar’s Palestinian-South African co-production echoes both countries’ experiences with apartheid and the need to amplify the voices of artists shedding light on these atrocities.
At the end of the film, Ahmad Ghunaim was able to escape Israeli-occupied Gaza through the Egyptian border, eventually finding refuge in South Africa. The emotional weight of having to leave the land that shaped him—and the responsibility of carrying his people’s story—permeates this final part. When we see him again on screen, it is easy to notice the change in visual language and storytelling devices. He is no longer behind the camera per se, but seated in front of it, his speech reminiscent of the voice-overs from the beginning of the film to illustrate that they were recorded afterwards, when he had already escaped.
This creative decision is one I found to be powerful. The shift in framing and colour grading shows a transformation—not just in Ahmad’s circumstances, but in his role. Where he was once the observer and documentarian, holding the camera like a lifeline and a witness, here he is now the subject, offering a reflection rather than capturing it. The difference between his mobile-shot, on-the-ground footage and this composed, reflective moment highlights the emotional and psychological distance between surviving and remembering. This is how storytelling itself evolves in exile—from a means of survival to an act of healing and resistance.
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