Four promising Bedouin directors from the Negev desert turn the camera on themselves and their society to record a self-portrait of their community and its hardships. This unprecedented and authentic account tells the story of the nomadic Bedouins who were forced by the Israeli government to relinquish their lifestyle and relocate to villages and townships characterised by poverty, neglect and crime. While they try to move forward and progress, they are still held back by desert traditions and by the discrimination they face from the Israeli establishment and society at large.

In cooperation with filmmaker Uri Rosenwaks, who founded a film class in the Bedouin city of Rahat over six years ago, four first-time directors bring modern Bedouin life to the screen. The four short films are intertwined with rare archival materials on the history of the Bedouin minority in Israel. The film moves back and forth between the personal and the general, the past and the present. Back and Forth is the second documentary feature produced within the independent cinematic project in Rahat led by Uri Rosenwaks.