• News
    • Business
    • Canada
    • Health
    • International
    • Israel
  • Perspectives
    • Advice
    • Big Ideas
    • CJN Podcast Network
    • Features
    • Opinions
  • Food
  • Culture
    • Arts & Entertainment
    • Books & Authors
    • Russian
    • Sports
    • Travel
  • Events
    • Contests
    • Montreal – About Town
    • Toronto – What’s New
  • Supplements
    • Spotlights
  • En Français
  • Podcasts
  • Subscribe
  • Member Centre
  • Log Out
Search
  • Subscribe
  • Member Centre (eCJN)
  • Log Out
  • Newsletter
  • FaceBook
  • Twitter
  • Youtube
  • Instagram
CJN - Canada’s largest Jewish newspaper
April 17, 2021 - 5 Iyar 5781
CJN - Canada’s largest Jewish newspaper
  • News
    • The race to be the leader of the Conservative Party

      Q & A with Ari Greenwald: Responding to a pandemic

      Israel declares complete coronavirus lockdown on eve of Passover

      Gantz says forming a unity government may take more time

      Students learn computer programming RHA FACEBOOK PHOTO

      Online classes up and running in Vancouver

      AllBusinessCanadaHealthInternationalIsrael
  • Perspectives
    • A Long-Awaited Return, feat. Jody Avirgan

      To our readers: Everything has its season. It is time

      Listen: The CJN Podcast Network, Signing Off

      Healthy Aging: Your next doctor appointment will likely be virtual

      Shinewald: Making this awful moment more tolerable

      AllAdviceBig IdeasCJN Podcast NetworkFeaturesOpinions
  • Food
    • Delicious desserts for Passover

      Festive food for small seders

      Passover meals for the whole day

      Passover taco Tuesday

      Family Seder recipes

  • Culture
    • How philosophy and theology can be in dialogue together

      Socalled is trying to make the best of his downtime

      Veteran singer returns with ‘toxic’ single

      Stories explore relationships between family, friends

      Jewish movies you should stream while self-isolating

      AllArts & EntertainmentBooks & AuthorsRussianSportsTravel
  • Events
    • CJN VIP

      How’d you like to be a VIP? Giveaway

      Giveaway: The Song of Names advance screenings contest (CLOSED)

      CJN-Prize-new-Entry Ad 2019

      The CJN Prize 2019 (Closed)

      Come celebrate the launch of the CJN Podcast Network

      Jewish Music Week Contest (Closed)

      AllContestsMontreal – About TownToronto – What’s New
  • Supplements
    • Passover Greetings

      Focus-on-Ed-2020

      Focus on Education

      Celebrations-MS-20

      Celebrations

      Hanukkah Greetings

      Celebrations

      AllSpotlights
  • En Français
    • À la mémoire d’un ardent ambassadeur de la culture sépharade, Solly Levy Z.’L.’

      “La haine des Juifs n’a jamais eu de limite”

      Le dossier du Dr. Marcus Fraenkel: la réponse de la CIVS

      Israéliens et Palestiniens luttent ensemble contre le coronavirus

      La lutte contre le coronavirus au Centre médical Sheba de Ramat Gan

  • Podcasts
  • Subscribe
  • Member Centre
  • Log Out
Home News Documentary focuses on a homeless teen in Jerusalem
  • News

Documentary focuses on a homeless teen in Jerusalem

By
Dave Gordon
-
May 21, 2008
1614
0

Early in Naf, there is a scene in which Naftali and his girlfriend are in a heated debate about whether he should be taking advantage of Christian missionaries, duping them into believing he believes in Jesus, so he can stay in their youth shelter.

To lie for the sake of personal safety – one of many dilemmas for a homeless teenager.

Directed by Moshe Alafi, RIGHT, and presented at the Miles Nadal Jewish Community Centre as part of the recent Toronto Jewish Film Festival, the documentary Naf: Street Kid follows 16-year-old Naftali Yawitz, who spent 21/2 years living in the streets of Jerusalem. He left his haredi parents’ home in England at 13.  

The protagonist of the film is neither entirely bad nor entirely good. He is both a hero and a victim, with deep flaws. Indulging in petty crime, he steals money from cab drivers. He is a drug dealer who passes off baggies of oregano to unsuspecting buyers.

Yet there are some moments that show Naf’s good character.

He refuses to sell drugs to a certain addict and spends a long time arguing with her about why he cannot conduct such business, for moral reasons, lest she risk overdose. He visits the Kotel to pray to “Aba” – the heavenly Father – for good fortune. He dons tfillin and tallit in a downtown square. How much of this is a show for the camera no one can be sure. But who of us should refuse a boy the opening to come home again, even if initially through superficial actions?

This street kid does not wholly live in a world of sex, drink, drugs and party-induced stupors, the film tells us. His ambition is to make life better for himself – to keep hope alive, however misguided the course.

He wants a career in rap music, and Naf negotiates with the Israel Defence Forces radio station to play his CD.

As a representative of 350 homeless youths, Naf wants an acknowledgment from the Jerusalem City Council that street kids need more, and better quality, attention. Exasperated, he later resigns from his position, doing so by sending a handwritten letter of protest. The viewer learns that, for Naf, the sting of indifference is worse than life’s pain .

“Naf has a goal. He fights for something. He doesn’t accept his situation,” said Alafi at the film’s Q&A. “I’m not a social worker, but my duty as a filmmaker is to raise this problem up.”

Naf has the strength to keep on fighting when many are indifferent to him. He is to face in court the middle-aged neighbour who sexually abused him, but the trial is postponed twice without prior notice. Enraged, Naf raises his voice to the prosecuting lawyer and is promptly escorted away by security, left to weep on a courthouse foyer bench.

Alafi’s direction is discreet, without contrived closeups or ham-handed focus on the grittier aspects of homelessness. Pulling strings of empathy, however, is not the film’s thrust.

Naf is injured in a street brawl, of which little is shown. No doubt the four-inch gash in Naf’s skull is one of many bodily scars he has. It’s through this that we meet Chana, a social worker who makes a complaint to the authorities on his behalf. It is through her the viewer learns that love is thicker than blood – for a homeless boy, she is all he has for family.

She is his protector after he is caught selling drugs. It is she, on camera, who quietly protests at the courthouse that a 16-year-old cannot be rehabilitated by throwing him in jail.

The film is not an investigation into the issue of the some 39,000 abused and neglected street kids in Israel. Though it is a documentary on street life, there are no interviews with government officials, social workers or many other street kids. Through Naf’s story, Alafi conveys the message that without something to open our eyes to the higher possibilities of life, we might all be Nafs.

At the Q&A, Alafi told the audience that as of last Yom Kippur, Naf has returned to observant Judaism, works full time at a supermarket and is engaged to be married.

 

Dave Gordon

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

A Long-Awaited Return, feat. Jody Avirgan

A message to our readers with an update:

À la mémoire d’un ardent ambassadeur de la culture sépharade, Solly Levy Z.’L.’

Subscribe to the CJNSubscribe
RSS FeedView
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Subscribe / Member Centre (eCJN)
  • eCJN Archives
  • Supplements
  • Media Kit
  • Advertising Terms
  • Premiums

OY CANADA: "Oh Canada", Klezmer-Style

PODCAST TRAILER: These Are a Few of My Favourite Jews

75th Anniversary - Liberation of Auschwitz

  • Canada
  • Israel
  • International
  • Opinions
  • Food
  • Culture
  • En Français
  • CJN Podcast Network
The award-winning Canadian Jewish News (CJN) is Canada’s largest, weekly Jewish newspaper with an audited circulation of nearly 32,000 and read by more than 100,000 people each week.
© 2021 Canadian Jewish News
  • Comments Policy
  • Community Links
  • Contact Us
  • Media Kit
  • Privacy Policy
  • Subscribe
  • Admin
 Tweet
 Share
 WhatsApp
 Copy
 E-mail
 Tweet
 Share
 WhatsApp
 Copy
 E-mail
 Tweet
 Share
 LinkedIn
 WhatsApp
 Copy
 E-mail