Yesterday, after the daily Ramadan fast, Israeli settlers attacked the Palestinian village of Susiya in the West Bank. This shameful act was conducted by the Israeli settlers after Hamdan Ballal, a movie director and a Susiya residence, won an Oscar for his documentary “No Other Land”. During this attack, Israeli settlers injured Ballal and arrested him, along with many others. The Israeli police and IDF stood guarding the illegal Israeli settlers during the attack, as they always do.
Hamdan Ballal is the co-director of “No Other Land,” which won an Oscar this year for best documentary feature. The documentary film shows Israeli extremism and the destruction of Palestinian villages in the West Bank. After the release of the film, it instantly became controversial in Israel, drawing wide criticism from the Israeli officials, including the Israeli Culture Minister, calling it a “Sad moment for the world of cinema”.
Earlier this month, when “No Other Land” won the Oscar, illegal Israeli settlers started coming to the Hamdan’s village to create trouble. But on this particular day, the Illegal settlers started hurling stones at Ballal’s house and chased him when he attempted to protect his home from stoning. While protecting his home, Ballal was beaten severely with clubs and stones. According to witnesses, Israeli soldiers were guarding settlers while they attacked Hamdan and destroyed his house. A few moments later, the settlers apprehended him, handcuffed and blindfolded, and then moved him to a military vehicle while he was bleeding.
As the Center for Jewish Nonviolence (CJNV) witnessed and documented the events, their video shows that masked settlers also attacked other Palestinians in the village around Hamdan’s neighborhood. It didn’t stop there; the settlers also attacked American Jewish activists who tried to intervene and protect Ballal, and everything happened in front of the IDF and Israeli police forces as if they were just guarding the violent attackers.
Though the Jewish Nonviolence group witnessed and documented the horrific events, the IDF gave a rather different statement claiming that the violence began when “terrorists” in the village threw rocks at the Israeli settlers. As a result, the illegal settlers attacked the villagers, including Ballal, and following that, the IDF had to arrest the film director while he was bleeding. The IDF also detained the members of the Center for Jewish Nonviolence because they were trying to protect the filmmaker who was being cruelly beaten by the settlers. However, later, Ballal was released after spending hours in custody.
This particular settler violence toward Palestinians is not an isolated incident, it is part of a common and growing pattern in the West Bank. According to our sources, more than 40+ settler violence have been witnessed since No Other Land won the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature. Not only Ballal but Basel Adra, another director of the film, has also been attacked multiple times by illegal settlers in the region.
Not only for these events, the Israeli military and police, along with its extremist settlers, have regularly been criticized for their systemic violence against the Palestinians. Numerous rights organizations across the world have also documented, witnessed, reported, and condemned the systemic violence. But now, more than ever, the Susiya village and other villages around are being targeted because of the film revealing Israel’s “cruelty culture”.
