As a film about “terror” spilling over from its local context (the struggle
over Palestine) into the global arena, Munich transcends the specificity
of the so-called “Palestinian question” to become a contemporary allegory
of the Western construct of “the war on terror.” The essay explores
the boundaries and contradictions of the “moral universe” constructed
and mediated by the film, interpreted by some as a dovish critique of
Israeli (and post-9/11 U.S.) policy. Along the way, the author probes
whether this “Hollywood Eastern” continues the long Zionist tradition
seen in popular films from Exodus onwards, or signals a rupture (or
even latent subversion) of it
