I knew that "The Voice of Hind Rajab" is based on the recordings of a 5-year-old Palestinian girl in the Gaza Strip, trapped in a car with the bodies of her family members, speaking with rescue workers. I knew that the girl--Hind Rajab--was eventually killed too. And I knew that the film was made by Kaouther Ben Hania, the Tunisian director who has invented ways to mix documentary and fiction filmmaking that make it impossible to look away.

The movie isn't suspenseful, in the sense that you know how the story ends. And it is eerily kind to the viewer, who never has to see the little girl stuck in the car, the little girl terrified of being killed, the little girl dying. All you see are the rescue-center workers at their office in Ramallah (the film was actually shot on a set in Tunisia)--computers, glass partitions, a soaring but sterile view of the sky.

Their task is to coordinate, to get clearance for an ambulance in Gaza to pick up the child. It's an eight-minute drive for the ambulance, but the car can't set off until its mission and route are approved; we never know exactly by whom. Eventually, as I knew going in, the ambulance would be shelled by Israeli forces, and everyone would die.

What I didn't realize when I resisted seeing the movie was that these deaths were not its subject. The subject of the movie is the moral injury inflicted on people who became implicated in these deaths, even as they tried to prevent them. Had I known, I might have been even more scared of seeing "The Voice of Hind Rajab," because this focus hits even closer to home.

The most important word in this film is "coordination." This word is whispered and yelled, mouthed with desperate need, shouted with disdain, and called forth as though it were a magic spell.

Coordination is the process by which rescue workers arrange for a safe route for an ambulance. At one........

© Arkansas Online