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<a class="gmail-domain gmail-reader-domain" href="https://variety.com/2024/film/global/palestinian-filmmakers-accuse-hollywood-dehumanizing-gaza-israel-1236120786/">variety.com</a>
<h1 class="gmail-reader-title">Palestinian Filmmakers Accuse Hollywood of 'Dehumanizing' Their People</h1>
<div class="gmail-credits gmail-reader-credits">Variety Staff</div>August 28, 2024<br></div><div class="gmail-header gmail-reader-header gmail-reader-show-element"><h2 id="gmail-section-heading">
More Than 65 Palestinian Filmmakers, Including Hany Abu Assad, Elia
Suleiman and Farah Nabulsi, Sign Letter Accusing Hollywood of
‘Dehumanizing’ Palestinians (EXCLUSIVE)
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<img src="https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/Hany-Elia-Farah.jpg?w=1000&h=666&crop=1" alt="Hany Abu Assad, Elia Suleiman and Farah Nabulsi" height="302" width="454" class="gmail-moz-reader-block-img" style="margin-right: 25px;">
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<cite>Getty</cite>
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A group of almost 70 Palestinian filmmakers — including two-time Oscar nominee Hany Abu Assad, acclaimed director <a href="https://variety.com/t/elia-suleiman/" id="gmail-auto-tag_elia-suleiman">Elia Suleiman</a>
and recent BAFTA winner Farah Nabulsi — have signed a strongly-worded
letter in which they accuse Hollywood of “dehumanising” Palestinians on
screen over decades, a factor they assert has helped enable the ongoing
devastation in <a href="https://variety.com/t/gaza/" id="gmail-auto-tag_gaza">Gaza</a>.</p>
<p>
The letter — also signed by the likes of multiple-award winners including Michel Khleifi, Mai Masri, <a href="https://variety.com/t/najwa-najjar/" id="gmail-auto-tag_najwa-najjar">Najwa Najjar</a> and the 22-strong list of directors behind the compilation of shorts “From Ground Zero,” <a href="https://variety.com/t/palestine/" id="gmail-auto-tag_palestine">Palestine</a>‘s
current submission to the Oscars — also expresses outrage and what it
described as the “inhumanity and racism shown by some in the Western
entertainment industry towards our people, even during this most
difficult of times.”
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<p>
The letter marks the first collaborative initiative by Palestinian
filmmakers since the horrific events of Oct. 7, in which terror group
Hamas — which rules Gaza — killed more than 1,200 Israelis and took more
than 250 hostage, and the ongoing retaliatory attacks on Gaza by
Israel, which have killed more than 40,000 Palestinians (according to
the Palestinian Health Authority) and led to a humanitarian crisis in
the territory.
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<p>
Despite its fierce criticism of Hollywood, the letter does thank the
National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences for “standing up to
pressure and insisting on freedom of expression,” by refusing attempts
to disqualify a Gaza-focused documentary from the 2024 Emmy nominations.
</p>
<p>
The Peabody Award-winning “It’s Bisan From Gaza and I’m Still Alive,”
by Palestinian journalist, activist and filmmaker Bisan Owda and
chronicling her family’s plight as they flee bombardment of their home
in by Israel, is nominated for the News and Documentary Emmys for
Outstanding Hard News Feature Story: Short Form. However, there were
calls by a U.S.-based pro-Israel group for the nomination to be
rescinded, with a letter signed by the likes of Debra Messing, Sherry
Lansing, Rick Rosen and Haim Saba accusing Owda of having ties to the
Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a United
States-designated terrorist group.</p>
<p>
In response, NATAS president Adam Sharp said that Owda’s nomination
would not be rescinded, writing in a letter that the organisation had
been “unable to corroborate these reports” of Owda’s alleged involvement
and “found no grounds, to date, upon which to overturn the editorial
judgment of the independent journalists who reviewed the material.”
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<p>
See the letter by the Palestinian filmmakers list of signatures below:</p>
<p>
<em>We, Palestinian filmmakers, appreciate and thank the National
Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS) for standing up to
pressure and insisting on freedom of expression by upholding Bisan
Owda’s 2024 News and Documentary Emmy nomination for the documentary,
“It’s Bisan From Gaza and I’m Still Alive.” </em></p>
<p>
<em>This film is narrated by the award-winning and inspiring
25-year-old Palestinian journalist, Bisan Owda, who has risked her life
to share with the world reports and stories about the resilience,
resistance and survival of ordinary Palestinian families in the face of
Israel’s ongoing, livestreamed genocide in the occupied Gaza Strip. </em></p>
<p>
<em>Trying to censor Bisan’s voice is only the latest repressive
attempt to deny Palestinians the right to reclaim our narrative, share
our history, and in this case bring attention to the atrocities our
people are facing in the hopes that we can bring an end to them. We well
understand the power of image and cinema, and for far too long we have
been outraged at the inhumanity and racism shown by some in the Western
entertainment industry towards our people, even during this most
difficult of times. </em></p>
<p>
<em>Through our films, we have tried to present alternative narratives,
depictions and images to reverse the stereotypical, dehumanizing
“worthless, disposable beings” image which enables the whitewashing
and/or justification of the crimes perpetrated for decades against
Palestinians. But why must we always put on our “boxing gloves” to
defend our art against ruthless censorship that targets us merely on the
basis of our identity, not our creativity? </em></p>
<p>
<em>We wholeheartedly welcomed the nomination of Bisan Owda’s film for
an Emmy as an indication that, after so many years of Israel’s apartheid
and settler-colonial rule over the Palestinian people, the relentless,
decades-old</em><em> dehumanization of Palestinians on small and big
screens in the U.S., in Hollywood in particular, was beginning to give
way to a more ethical stance. The censorship attempt against the film,
though, was a reality check of sorts. We must still contend with and
fiercely challenge the anti-Palestinian and generally anti-Arab racist
propaganda that remains all too prevalent in Western entertainment
media. </em></p>
<p>
<em>Although we are deeply concerned at how this dehumanization is a
danger to our very existence as Palestinians, we are cognizant of how it
also puts many racialized communities around the world, including in
the West, at risk of a similar fate as the “might makes right” credo
prevails. </em></p>
<p>
<em>We call on our international colleagues in the film industry,
visionaries for the kind of world we would like to live in, to speak out
against this genocide and the erasure, racism and censorship that
enable it; to do everything humanly possible to stop and end complicity
with this unspeakable horror; and to stand against working with
production companies that are deeply complicit in dehumanizing
Palestinians, or whitewashing and justifying Israel’s crimes against
us. </em>
</p>
<p>
<em>This has to stop. Now.</em></p>
<p>
Signed:</p>
<div>
<ol><li>Michel Khleifi</li><li>Mai Masri</li><li>Hany Abu Assad</li><li>Najwa Najjar</li><li>Elia Suleiman</li><li>Rashid Masharawi</li><li>Farah Nabulsi</li><li>Mohammad Bakri</li><li>Maha Haj</li><li>Mahdi Fleifel</li><li>Raed Andoni</li><li>Kamal Aljafari</li><li>Saleh Bakri</li><li>Mohanad Yaqubi</li><li>Tarzan Nasser</li><li>Arab Nasser</li><li>Ossama Bawardi</li><li>Rakan Mayasi</li><li>Khadija Habashneh</li><li>Leila Sansour</li><li>Khaled Jarrar</li><li>Rula Nasser</li><li>May Odeh</li><li>Adam Bakri</li><li>Iyad Alasttal</li><li>Amer Shomali</li><li>Carol Mansour</li><li>Muna Khalidi</li><li>Mohamed Jabaly</li><li>Salim abu Jabal</li><li>Suha Arraf</li><li>Firas Khoury</li><li>Randa Nassar</li><li>Yasmine Al Massri</li><li>Wisam Al Jafari</li><li>Ismael El Habbash</li><li>Muayad Alayan</li><li>Sawsan Asfari</li><li>Kamel el Basha</li><li>Rozeen Bisharat</li><li>Nadia Eliewat</li><li>Ward Kayyal</li><li>Maryse Gargour</li><li>Amer Hlehel</li><li>Ziad Bakri</li><li>Aws Al-Banna*</li><li>Ahmed Al-Danf*</li><li>Basil Al-Maqousi*</li><li>Mustafa Al-Nabih*</li><li>Muhammad Alshareef*</li><li>Ala’a Ayob*</li><li>Bashar Al-Balbeisi*</li><li>Alaa Damo*</li><li>Hana Awad*</li><li>Ahmad Hassouna*</li><li>Mustafa Kallab*</li><li>Kareem Satoum*</li><li>Mahdi Karirah*</li><li>Rabab Khamees*</li><li>Khamees Masharawi*</li><li>Wissam Moussa*</li><li>Tamer Najm*</li><li>Nidaa Abu Hasna*</li><li>Nidal Damo*</li><li>Reema Mahmoud*</li><li>E’temad Weshah*</li><li>Islam Al Zrieai*</li></ol>
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