Pledge to boycott Israeli film institutions draws signatures of top
Hollywood actors and directors
[September 10, 2025]
NEW YORK (AP) — Some prominent Hollywood names are among the filmmakers
and industry figures who've signed a pledge to boycott Israeli film
institutions — including festivals, broadcasters and production
companies — that are “implicated in genocide and apartheid against the
Palestinian people,” organizers said Tuesday.
The group Film Workers for Palestine posted an open letter on Monday
including signatures from Hollywood luminaries like Emma Stone, Ayo
Edebiri, Ava DuVernay, Olivia Colman, Yorgos Lanthimos, Riz Ahmed, Rob
Delaney, Javier Bardem, Tilda Swinton and Cynthia Nixon among many
others. The group said it had collected more than 3,000 industry
signatures since the pledge was made public.
“As filmmakers, actors, film industry workers, and institutions, we
recognize the power of cinema to shape perceptions,” the open letter
says. “In this urgent moment of crisis, where many of our governments
are enabling the carnage in Gaza, we must do everything we can to
address complicity in that unrelenting horror.”
Film Workers for Palestine — a group of film professionals based in
various countries formed in early 2024 — said their pledge was inspired
by Filmmakers United Against Apartheid, who refused to screen their
films in apartheid South Africa.
“We pledge not to screen films, appear at or otherwise work with Israeli
film institutions — including festivals, cinemas, broadcasters and
production companies — that are implicated in genocide and apartheid
against the Palestinian people,” the letter says.
The group has not called for a boycott on all Israeli film institutions.
It claims on its website that Israel’s public and private broadcasters
“have decades-old and ongoing involvement in whitewashing, denying and
justifying Israel’s war crimes” and also says Israel’s major film
festivals — including the Jerusalem Film Festival, Haifa International
Film Festival and others — “continue to partner with the Israeli
government while it carries out what leading experts have defined as
genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.”
But it says that it does not consider all film institutions in Israel
complicit, and advises people to ask questions and “seek guidelines set
by Palestinian civil society.”
The Jerusalem Film Festival did not immediately reply to a request for
comment.
[to top of second column]
|
Demonstrators, from left, hold placards that read 'On the red carpet
lets sow peace' and 'Free Palestine, peace has no borders' during a
march in support of the Palestinian people in Gaza, during the Film
Festival in Venice, Italy, Saturday, Aug. 30, 2025. (Photo by
Alessandra Tarantino/Invision/AP)
 The pledge also specifies that it is
targeting institutions and not individuals: “The call is for film
workers to refuse to work with Israeli institutions that are
complicit in Israel’s human rights abuses against the Palestinian
people. This refusal takes aim at institutional complicity, not
identity.”
A representative of the Israeli film and television industry called
the boycott “misguided.”
“We are the industry that (has been) struggling for years, making
efforts for decades to promote discussion,” working with
Palestinians and Israelis to tell the story of the conflict from all
sides, said Tzvika Gottlieb, CEO of the Israeli Film & TV Producers
Association, in an interview.
Gottlieb said his industry “has consistently maintained a critical
stance toward government policies, and is very vocal in criticism of
this administration’s current actions. We urgently call for an
immediate end to the violence, an end to the suffering, and the
release of all hostages right now.”
His group added in official remarks that “this call for a boycott is
profoundly misguided. By targeting us — the creators who give voice
to diverse narratives and foster dialogue — these signatories are
undermining their own cause and attempting to silence us.”
In response, Film Workers for Palestine issued a statement to The
Associated Press, saying their initiative is “rooted in historic
struggles," in particular "the successful international movement to
end the apartheid regime of South Africa.”
“Should Israeli film institutions wish to continue working with
pledge signatories, their choice is clear: end complicity in
Israel’s genocide and apartheid, and endorse the full rights of the
Palestinian people under international law, in line with Palestinian
civil society guidelines," the statement said. "To date, almost none
has.”
The pledge comes after a pro-Palestinian demonstration at the recent
Venice International Film Festival drew an estimated 10,000
participants. That followed a call by a group called
Venice4Palestine for the festival to condemn the destruction in
Gaza.
All contents © copyright 2025 Associated Press. All rights reserved |
