Siege, The

April 2002. Spring in Bethlehem. A group of armed men seek sanctuary in one of the world’s holiest sites as the Israeli army closes in with helicopters, tanks and snipers. Along with the fighters are some 200 priests, nuns and civilians. The siege lasts for 39 days, paralysing the centre of Bethlehem and keeping tens of thousands under curfew. Read more …

Inside the Church of the Nativity the besieged are hungry and weakening. The smell of unwashed bodies and broken lavatories is mixed with the stench from the suppurating wounds of the injured. Two dead bodies are decomposing in a cave below the church. While the world is watching, the fighters are faced with the question of whether to struggle to the end or to surrender. No matter what they choose, they will have to leave their families and their homeland behind forever.

The critical consensus

As performed by an all male cast of six, there is an impassioned partisan rawness to what follows, as we flit between the siege itself and the men's lives afterwards far from their homeland.

(*) (*) Neil Cooper, Coffee-Table Notes, 18/06/2015