As the US-led war against IS in Iraq is almost concluded, eleven-year-old girl Ala’ wants to return to her house in Mosul; a city nearly entirely reduced to rubble due to coalition airstrikes. Through Ala’s eyes we discover how war pervades the life of one human being. Parallel to Ala’s story Lise Grande, head of the humanitarian mission of the United Nations, and Dutch ambassador Jan Waltmans work around the clock to help people returning to Mosul safely. In the search for a new future, hope proves to be valuable as well as scarce.

‘City of two springs’ is an intimate film about human resilience in the most difficult circumstances possible.

After the screening, Lauren Gould (Intimacies of Remote Warfare project) will lead a discussion with the directors of the documentary (Frederick Mansell and Laurens Samson) and Wilbert van der Zeijden, who is the Defence and Security Policies project coordinator at PAX, and Saba Azeem (intern Civilian Protection at PAX) who previously worked with various ngo’s in refugee camps in Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan.