On February 5, 2003, during a press conference held adjacent to the UN Security Council, cameras flashed and tape rolled as Colin Powell patiently explained to a wary international audience the case for a war against Iraq.

A review of
"Forget Baghdad: Jews and Arabs – The Iraqi Connection"
Directed by Samir
110 min., 2002
by Geoffrey Garrison - 05/02/2003
published on The Thing [Reviews]

"Cinema shows us how we imagine other groups of people and how we imagine ourselves," according to Ella Shohat, professor of cultural studies and film studies at the City University of New York, in an interview featured in the film Forget Baghdad. Directed by Samir (who uses only his first name), and released in 2002 with the subtitle Jews and Arabs -- The Iraqi Connection, the film's intentions are clear from the get-go; over subjective shots of feet hurrying to catch a plane, a stewardess's greeting upon boarding, and a city at night beneath the wing, the filmmaker's voice-over explains that he is on his way to Israel, "the enemy" as he calls it, to search for his father's Iraqi Jewish comrades from the Iraqi Communist party. In addition to having made some forty-odd films, Samir, Iraqi-born and raised in Switzerland, has shown in an art context and is co-founder of the Zurich-based production company Dschoint Ventschr.