Talleen Abu Hanna prefers to flee the war. If only for twenty-four hours. At the end of April, in Paris, far from the bloody conflict between Israel and Hamas, the young 29-year-old transgender woman, in a blue silk top and meticulous makeup, tries to forget the deaths, the risks of regional conflagration and its ” struggle “ facing the national unity demanded by the Jewish state, she who was born into a Palestinian and Christian family from Nazareth, in the north of Israel.
After six months of military operations, Talleen Abu Hanna seems afraid to take a stand while Israel’s LGBTQ+ community is blacklisted abroad by part of the pro-Palestinian movement, which accuses it of condoning tacit the war waged by the Hebrew State. At his side, Israela Lev, 63, veteran of the fight for LGBTQ+ rights who presents herself as both the manager and the ” mother “ (a protective figure in queer culture) by Talleen Abu Hanna, sighs sadly when asked about the conflict: “Rather than taking a rifle in our hands to go to war, we prefer to do our nails, put on makeup, inject ourselves with Botox. » Or go to the Cannes Film Festival.
In May, Talleen Abu Hanna and Israela Lev will present the documentary there The Beauty of Gazadirected by Yolande Zauberman (Would You Have Sex With an Arab? in 2011 And M, César for best documentary film in 2018) and screened in a special screening on May 22, before its theatrical release on the 29th. Shot before the war, the film intertwines the sometimes tragic destinies of several transgender women in Israel, many of them sex workers gathered in the same sinister street in Tel Aviv.
A young woman, the Beauty of the title, reportedly fled the Gaza Strip, where she was threatened with death because of her trans identity, to come on foot to Tel Aviv. Talleen Abu Hanna does not play this mysterious character, who appears only rarely in the documentary. But she is a central figure in this story, a symbol of success, a perspective of hope in the midst of other darker paths. That day, in Paris, she spoke little about the conflict and focused on the fate of transgender people, whom she described “at war with their body”.
Famous in her country, it is up to her, in part, to promote the film. Model, dancer, reality TV personality (“Big Brother”, the local “Loft Story”), she was also the face of an advertising campaign for the Spanish ready-to-wear brand Desigual. Followed by nearly two hundred and fifty thousand people on Instagram, it is not uncommon for her to be approached in the streets of Tel Aviv by fans looking for a selfie. Even in the current context. “When the guns fire, we must respond with hope,” smiles Talleen Abu Hanna.
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