BRIDES LEAVE HOME FOREVER KUNEITRA CROSSING, Golan Heights, March 3, 2007 –In a buffer zone between two bitter enemies, Arwad Abushahen waved a heartbroken farewell to her family, above centre, her joy at marrying the man she loves tempered by the fact she might never see her home again. After she and Mohanad Hareb wed in a ceremony held in no man's land along the heavily guarded Israel-Syria frontier, Abushahen followed her husband to his home in , knowing she'd be barred from returning to her village in the Golan Heights, which captured from 40 years ago.
It takes approximately one year for the International Red Cross to arrange for these weddings. The couple getting married, along with a selected number of family and friends may attend the ceremony and stay with the bride and groom for one hour before they are escorted back to their zone.
Wearing a strapless white wedding dress, Abushahen was escorted by Red Cross officials over the border and into , where she was greeted by a crowd of relatives and members of Hareb's family. Abushahen, 25, is from the Druse village of Buqata on the Golan Heights. Hareb, 26, is a Druse from . Distant relatives, they met at a family reunion in , which has diplomatic relations with both and .
captured the strategic heights from in the 1967 Mideast War and annexed them in 1981. The Golan is home to 40,000 people, half of them Jewish and half Druse, a religious sect with its roots in Islam. The decades-long conflict between and its neighbours has left the Druse living under Israeli sovereignty cut off from their co-religionists in and .
and have been in a state of war since was created in 1948, and their frontier is sealed and lined with minefields. But since the late 1980s, and have allowed a small number of Golan Druse to cross the frontier on religious pilgrimages or to study.
Women can also cross in both directions to get married – but they cannot cross back.
Since 2001, about 70 Druse brides have come from to the Golan, many of them returning with Golan Druse men studying in , said Yael Segev-Eytan, a spokeswoman for the International Committee of the Red Cross. But Abushahen's departure is the first time since 2001 that a Golan bride has gone to , she said.
The wedding closely replicated the plot of The Syrian Bride, pictures above left and right, a 2004 Israeli film that told the story of a young Druse woman who leaves her family in the Golan Heights to marry a Syrian Druse man, knowing she can't return.
Abushahen's sister-in-law, Suha Abushahen, originally from , left her own family and crossed the border three years ago to marry Arwad's brother. Her only advice for the new bride was to "be happy.''
Abushahen's parents said they were against the wedding at first, because they didn't want Arwad to leave. The only way to see his newlywed daughter now, said her father, Yehya Abushahen, would be to travel to meet her in . "I didn't want her to go, but she's in love," said her father, Yehya Abushahen. "I wish there wasn't a fence so I could see my family.''
The Syrian Bride, the movie
Mona’s wedding day is the saddest day of her life.
She knows that once she crosses the border between and to marry Syrian TV star Tallel, she will never be allowed back to her beloved family, shown above, in Majdal Shams, the largest Druze village in the Golan Heights, occupied by since 1967. The Syrian Bride is a story about physical, mental and emotional borders and the will to cross them. A story about a family trying to cope with its ability to define boundaries and deal with them – focusing on Mona’s sister Amal, a modern woman trapped in a tradition and culture she wants to break out of.
Once you cross the border there is no way back and at the end of a long day, the family, the government and military officials and all those gathered on both sides of the border find themselves facing an uncertain future, trapped in No-Man’s land between and .
Actress Clara Khoury who plays Mona was also born in 1976, like Mona the Bride. She studied at the Bet Zvi school of acting and worked in the theatre for several years. In 2002 she starred in the film Rana’s Wedding. Khoury is actor Makram’s daughter.
The movie was shot on location in the Golan Heights and in other locations in . All the actors are Palestinian-Israelis, one is actually Druze (the Druze do not have a tradition of theatre and cinema), one French and one (Hiam Abbass) is Palestinian, Israeli and French. Visit: www.syrianbride.com or www.mongrelmedia.com.
