Side by Side or Face to Face
Israelis and Palestinians :
50 years of photography, by Jean Mohr
A photography exhibition organised by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)
A FRANCE INFO event 
 Jean Mohr
Jean Mohr is a photographer. For the last 50 years he has travelled the world, reporting on events in virtually every corner of the globe. Now 81, Mohr continues to pursue his career with passion. His close links with the ICRC go back to 1949-50 when he worked as a delegate in Jericho and Hebron before venturing into photography. His subsequent work represents a memoir of the conflict. He took his first photographs in the Palestinian territories in 1949 before embarking on his duties as an ICRC delegate in the refugee camps. Over the decades that followed he would return to Israel and Palestine on numerous occasions, notably during the Six-Day War in 1967. Still a frequent visitor to the region, his photographs continue to catalogue everyday life there.
The ICRC’s role
The ICRC has been present in Israel, the occupied territories and the autonomous territories since the Israeli-Arab War of 1948. Its mission is to ensure the strict observation of international human rights, in particular the Fourth Geneva Convention relative to the protection of civilian persons in time of war. In the current climate of violence, the ICRC’s work involves meeting the basic humanitarian needs of the civilian population, visiting detainees, and making the necessary representations to the relevant Israeli and Palestinian authorities. The organisation comes to the direct assistance of Palestinian people who have had their houses pulled down and to those most affected by the curfews, blockades and other restrictions imposed on the towns and villages of the West Bank. In its capacity as an organisational body, the ICRC coordinates the relief activities of the international Red Cross and Red Crescent movement. In addition, it also provides support for the activities of the Palestinian Red Cross and Magen David Adom.
The exhibition comes to Monaco
Side by Side or Face to Face is a travelling exhibition that started out in Israel and the Palestinian territories before visiting Amman, Cairo, Beirut, Tunis and Geneva. The exhibition is being staged at Monaco’s Grimaldi Forum as part of the 47th Monte Carlo Television Festival (10-14 June 2007), an event at which the ICRC has presented a special award for war reporters and documentary makers for the last five years.
Contact person: Frédéric Joli, ICRC spokesperson in France.
00 33 1 56 54 11 11 or 00 33 6 81 87 01 73. frederic_joli.par@cicr.org
An International Committee of the Red Cross exhibition held to mark the 5th Press Award to be presented by the ICRC at the 47th Monte Carlo Television Festival. Organised in conjunction with the Monaco Red Cross, with the support of the 47th Monte Carlo Television Festival, the URTI (International Radio and Television University), France Info and the Grimaldi Forum.
This exhibition of 60 photographs depicts the everyday life of people in Israel and the Palestinian territories between 1949 and 2002, and takes as its subject the faces of anxious women, concerned old people, and expectant youngsters. The exhibition also underlines the involvement of the ICRC and its local partners, the Palestinian Red Crescent and the Israeli emergency service, Magen David Adom. In casting his eye over the last 50 years, Jean Mohr subtly echoes the region’s turbulent existence, one that is interspersed with occasional flickers of hope.
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