More than 80 filmmakers denounce 'censorship' over Gaza at Berlinale
More than 80 filmmakers have signed an open letter to the Berlin International Film Festival (better known as Berlinale) criticising the German festival's stance on Gaza.
The signatories, including Tilda Swinton, Javier Bardem, Mike Leigh, Adam McKay and Avi Mograbi, accused the organiser of "censorship" over the issue and engaging in efforts to "silence" those discussing the issue.
"Last year, filmmakers who spoke out for Palestinian life and liberty from the Berlinale stage reported being aggressively reprimanded by senior festival programmers," read the letter.
"One filmmaker was reported to have been investigated by police, and Berlinale leadership falsely implied that the filmmaker’s moving speech - rooted in international law and solidarity - was 'discriminatory.'"
The new letter largely comes in response to comments made by German filmmaker Wim Wenders, who is also this year's jury head, in which he suggested that filmmaking should not be directly political.
New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch
Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters
Wenders, who began his career in the 1970s as part of the often explicitly left-wing New German Cinema movement, told a press conference last week that they had to "stay out of politics because if we make movies that are dedicatedly political, we enter the field of politics".
"But we are the counterweight of politics, we are the opposite of politics. We have to do the work of people, not the work of politicians," he said.
Asked about Germany's support for Israel's genocide in Gaza, another jury member Ewa Puszczynska said it was an "unfair" question and said there were "many other wars where genocide is committed, and we do not talk about that".
Award-winning Indian author Arundhati Roy said she was pulling out of the festival over the comments, and there has been further concern over the event's funding, which comes from the German government.
Others accused Wenders of hypocrisy, pointing to his directly contradictory comments about the festival in 2024, in which he said Berlinale had "traditionally always been the most political of the major festivals, it doesn't stay out of things now, and it won't in the future either… I like the Berlinale because it always speaks up and says something".
Continuing controversy
More than 200 films will be shown over the 10 days of the festival, of which 22 will be in competition for the Golden Bear, the top prize.
At a fringe event on Wednesday not directly connected to the festival, the director of The Voice of Hind Rajab also spoke out against German indifference to Palestinian suffering and complicity with Israel.
At the Cinema for Peace gala in Berlin, attended by former US Vice President Hillary Clinton and hosted by musician Bob Geldof, Tunisian filmmaker Kaouther Ben Hania rejected the “most valuable film” prize during the ceremony at the Adlon Hotel.
Ben Hania, whose film chronicles efforts to save Hind Rajab, a young Palestinian girl killed by Israeli forces in Gaza, criticised the decision to hand an honorary award to Noam Tibon, the former Israeli general featured in the Canadian documentary The Road Between Us.
“What happened to Hind is not an exception. It’s a part of a genocide. And tonight, in Berlin, there are people who gave political cover to that genocide by reframing the mass civilian killing as self-defence, as complex circumstances. By denigrating those who protest,” she said.
“But as you may know, peace is not a perfume sprayed over violence, so power can feel refined, and can feel comfortable. And cinema is not image-laundering.”
It is not the first time the Berlinale has faced controversy over Gaza.
The 2024 Berlinale faced outcry over the (later withdrawn) opening ceremony invitation for the far-right party Alternative fur Deutschland (AFD), and was branded "one-sided" and "antisemitic" by various German officials over comments made by the award-winning Israeli filmmaker Yuval Abraham.
Abraham's documentary No Other Land, which he co-directed with Basel Adra, a Palestinian from Masafer Yatta, depicted the Israeli state-sanctioned destruction of a small Palestinian community in the occupied West Bank.
"I am living under a civilian law and Basel is under military law," Abraham said in his acceptance speech.
"I have voting rights; Basel [does not have] voting rights. I'm free to move where I want in this land; Basel is, like millions of Palestinians, locked in the occupied West Bank."
There was further outcry after German Culture Minister Claudia Roth claimed she had only clapped for a speech by Abraham, and not Adra. The film later won an Oscar.
Middle East Eye delivers independent and unrivalled coverage and analysis of the Middle East, North Africa and beyond. To learn more about republishing this content and the associated fees, please fill out this form. More about MEE can be found here.
