Occupation Journalist, filmmaker Name Esther Schapira | Role Journalist | |
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Born January 23, 1961 (age 63) ( 1961-01-23 ) Frankfurt, Germany Nominations Deutscher Fernsehpreis - Best Documentary | ||
Esther Schapira (born January 23, 1961 in Frankfurt) is a German journalist and filmmaker, currently politics and society editor at the German public television network, the Hessischer Rundfunk.
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Schapira is co-author of The Act of Alois Brunner, and producer of two award-winning documentaries, Drei Kugeln und ein totes Kind ("Three bullets and a dead child") (2002), about the death of Muhammad al-Durrah in Gaza in 2000, and Der Tag, als Theo van Gogh ermordet wurde ("The day Theo van Gogh was murdered") (2007), about the killing in 2004 of Dutch filmmaker, Theo van Gogh. The latter won her and her co-producer, Kamil Taylan, a Prix Europa award. In 2009, she produced a second documentary about the death of al-Durrah, Das Kind, Der Tod, und Die Wahrheit ("The Child, the Death, and the Truth").
Background
Schapira completed her Abitur at the Frankfurt Helmholtzschule in 1982, and went on to study German and English language and literature, as well as theatre, film and television. She has been the politics and society editor at the German public television network, the Hessischer Rundfunk, since 1995.
Awards
Schapira's awards include the Elisabeth-Selbert-Preis (1987), the Radio-, TV- und Neue-Medien-Preis (1995), the German Critics Prize (1996), and the Civis – Europas Medienpreis für Integration prize (2002). She won first prize twice at the International Festival Law and Society in Moscow, for Drei Kugeln und ein totes Kind and Der Tag, als Theo van Gogh ermordet wurde. In 2007, she won the Buber-Rosenzweig-Medaille with Georg M. Hafner, and a commendation during Prix Europa for the Theo van Gogh documentary.
Death of Muhammad al-Durrah
Schapira has made two documentaries questioning the events surrounding the death of Muhammad al-Durrah in 2000, a Palestinian child reported to have been shot by Israeli soldiers. Schapira's first documentary hints that al-Durrah may have been shot by Palestinian gunmen however she has stated that she sees no proof of this. Her second suggested that two boys were killed in that area that day and that they may have been mixed up.