At the end of 2023 the Arab Film and Media Institute, in response to the beginning of the ongoing attacks against the people of Gaza, we started a program called Palestinian Voices. This became an ongoing series of screenings – in person and online – that highlight the stories of Palestinians as they want to tell them.
Each film offers us glimpses into the daily lives of the Palestinian people–their struggles under occupation, but also their hopes, dreams, and insistent reclamation of life. This year at the 28th Arab Film Festival, we are honored to share a selection of Palestinian Voices short films that explore childhood imagination, the efforts to return, and the solidarity that can be found in surprising places.
Throughout this dire time, we feel that it is more important than ever to share the history, culture, and stories of Palestine.
Palestinian Voices will screen on Oct. 25th in San Francisco and online. Browse the full festival schedule and plan your attendance today.
A Short Film About Kids
Directed by Ibrahim Handal
2023 – Comedy – Palestine – 10 min
Four kids from the refugee camp in Bethlehem decide to visit the sea for the first time in their life.
About the director, Ibrahim Handal
Ibrahim Handal is a cinematographer and filmmaker whom graduated in Cinematography in 2019 from Dar Al-Kalima University. He worked as a director of photography on several short films: Bethlehem 2001 (2020, Officially selected in Locarno, Clermont Ferrand, Busan and many others) AMBIENCE by Wissam Al Jafari (2019, Cannes Cinéfondation winner), SAWSAN (2019), BETWEEN YOU AND ME (2020). He directed three short films: COLD (2017, 5 ‘, experimental), HIM AND I (2019, 13’, fiction) and BETHLEHEM 2001 (2020).He also worked on several feature film productions in Palestine in the camera and lighting departments. Ibrahim is in development of his first feature film.
Where the Wind Blows
Directed by Hana Elias
2024 – Documentary – US, Palestine – 17 min
After building a life in New York City, Nassib returns to his hometown of Shefa-’Amr in Palestine for the first time in 50 years to revive an ancestral garden. Filmmaker Hana captures her whole family’s search for belonging as she intimately films her father Nassib planting, tending, and spending time in the garden over the course of five years.
About the director, Hana Elias
Hana is a Palestinian-American documentary filmmaker and journalist. Her work explores the interrelationships between land, and identity in the Middle East and the United States.
She aims to center the perspectives of people from underrepresented backgrounds as they imagine alternative realities and challenge hegemonic narratives. This ranges from her first film, The Rooftops of Jerusalem, a coming of age story about Palestinian parkour players in Jerusalem’s old city, and Holding Fire, about a grassroots movement of Muslim immigrant women fighting for their rights in the New York City political arena.
She has been working on documentaries for the last 8 years, as a video editor, camera person, and associate producer and is currently a Video News fellow at Democracy Now.
Director’s Statement
By continuing to use agrarian practices that have existed for thousands of years, and planting a diverse range of native plants, my parent’s garden in Shefa’Amr is a testament to the richness Palestinian agrarian heritage. I started filming this project organically as I spent time helping my father in the garden. As a Palestinian-American, I hope that my experience as someone from the diaspora returning to learn about my family’s origin can relate to global land back movements, and generations of people in the diaspora similarly questioning identity and belonging. While we witness how Palestinian land is burned and poisoned, this film demonstrates the richness of Palestinian culture and love for the land that is undeniable.
Palestine Islands
Directed by Nour Ben Salem & Julien Menanteau
2023 – Comedy, Drama – Palestine, Jordan – 22 min
Maha, 12, is part of the last generation of Palestinian refugees from the Balata camp. Following a faintness from her blind grandfather, she imagines a crazy project: to make him believe that the wall of separation has fallen and that a return to his native land is possible. With the help of her friends from the camp, the young girl imagines a funny trip for him…
About the directors, Nour Ben Salem & Julien Menanteau
After a master’s degree in cinema at the Sorbonne and a TV series course at La Fémis, Nour Ben Salem worked as a scriptwriter for television and cinema. She co-wrote the feature film Hard shell, soft shell directed by Emma Benestan (2021), as well as several episodes of the series Reign Supreme for Arte/Netflix. Palestine Islands is her first work as a director.
After studying cinema in Montreal and at the Sorbonne, Julien Menanteau directed his first short film Rikishi, followed by Samaritan, a creative documentary shot during two years in Palestine. Broadcasted on Arte, the film won a star from the SCAM. Lads, his first fiction feature, has just obtained an advance on receipts from the CNC.
Sokrania 59
Directed by Abdallah Al Khatib
2023 – Comedy – Algeria, France – 21 min
In Germany, a family of Syrian refugees of Palestinian origin is suddenly forced to cohabit with new residents: Maria and her daughter Sofia, who are fleeing the war in Ukraine.
About the director, Abdallah Al Khatib
Abdallah Jamal AlKhatib is a film director, writer and human rights defender. He was born in Damascus in 1989 and identifies as a Palestinian-Syrian. He studied Sociology at the University of Damascus and is currently completing his studies in Germany.
Before the revolution in Syria in 2011, he worked at the UNRWA as a coordinator for a youth support center in Yarmouk Camp. During the revolution he co-established a training center in his besieged Damascene neighborhood under the name ‘Watad Center for Training and Development’ with the aim of skill sharing amongst activists in the light of the absence of all state educational institutions.
He was selected by the German Greenpeace magazine as the Peacemaker of the Year 2014 and in 2016, he was awarded the Swedish Per Anger Prize for Human Rights. Since 2019, he has been living in Germany and working in the field of writing social studies, political articles and making documentaries.
In 2021, he published his award-winning first feature documentary Little Palestine – Diary of a Siege which has been showcased in over 50 countries, and won an honorable mention at the 2022 Arab Film Festival.
Palestinian Voices will screen on Oct. 25th in San Francisco and online.
For more information about the 28th Arab Film Festival, visit arabfilmfestival.org
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