Palestinian Group Calls Out Oscar-Winning Doc ‘No Other Land' for 'Normalization' of Israeli Occupation
The Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI), aligned with BDS, has called out No Other Land for allegedly violating so-called 'anti-normalization' guidelines that, the group argues, make the idea of Israeli 'occupation, apartheid, and settler colonialism seem normal and establishing normal relations with the Israeli regime.'
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No Other Land seems an unlikely target for pro-Palestinian groups. The film chronicles the repeated destruction and demolition of the Masafer Yatta community in the occupied West Bank and the alliance that develops between Palestinian journalist and co-director Basel Adra, and Israeli journalist and co-director Yuval Abraham. Since its debut at last year's Berlinale, where it won the best documentary prize, the film has come under attack from right-wing and pro-Israeli critics. Israel's culture and sports minister Miki Zohar called the film's Oscar win 'a sad moment for the world of cinema,' accusing the documentary of 'defamation of Israel.'
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization in the U.S., has thrown its support behind the film, publicly calling for U.S. distributors and streaming platforms to distribute the movie stateside. (Despite the Oscar win, No Other Land still does not have a U.S. distributor.) 'The American people deserve the right to see this film,' CAIR said.
In its statement on the film first published on March 5, PACBI acknowledges 'Israel, its massive lobby groups, and its anti-Palestinian racist partners in western cultural establishments,' have attacked No Other Land because they see it as 'exposing an important, if partial, dimension of Israel's system of colonial oppression [and] Israel's crimes, such as the ethnic cleansing of Masafer Yatta.'
But the group says the film still violates BDS guidelines, as it was produced with the help of Israeli documentary film NGO Close-Up, which did not provide any funding but assisted the filmmakers during development. PACBI has called for a boycott of Close-Up, which it claims is 'engaging in normalization' by encouraging filmmakers to engage with Israel 'as if it were a normal state.' In 2019, a call to boycott Close-Up was signed by more than 500 filmmakers, most from the Arab world, including Palestinian director Mohamed Bakri (Jenin, Jenin), Egyptian director Ali Badrakhan (Karnak Cafe), and Lebanese documentarian Eliane Raheb (Miguel's War).
PACBI also notes that there has been 'simmering controversy' around No Other Land in the Arab world, particularly since its Oscar win and the acceptance speech by co-director Abraham, in which he called out 'the atrocious destruction of Gaza and its people' as well as condemning the brutality of the October 7th attacks on Israel.
PACBI has also criticized some No Other Land's Israeli members for '[failing] to acknowledge that Israel is perpetrating a genocide, or have even made extremely harmful, immoral statements drawing a false equivalence between the colonizer and the colonized that may be used to rationalize Israel's genocide.'
PACBI, however, has stopped short of calling for a boycott of the film, saying that could prove 'counterproductive,' noting that in 'mainstream circles' the movie could help raise awareness 'about the struggle against Israel's military occupation and ethnic cleansing.'
In an FAQ statement published on the group's website on Monday, PACBI noted that, prior to the Oscars, the 'expected harm for the Palestinian struggle' from publicly criticizing the film was 'significantly higher than the expected benefit.' After the film won an Oscar, however, the group said it saw a danger in what it sees as No Other Land's 'normalization' with regards to Israel, particularly in the Arab region. 'This is also why,' the group writes, 'the position was originally crafted and released in Arabic for an Arab audience.'
Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, a PACBI spokesperson noted that BDS movement's anti-normalization guidelines 'target complicity not identity, and institutions, not individuals,' highlighting that the criticism of No Other Land is not directed at individual filmmakers, but at the movie's links to Close-Up.
THR has requested a comment from both Close-up and the No Other Land filmmakers but did not immediately receive a response.
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