Same filmmakers, harder film

Two of the team behind No Other Land have made something more devastating, moving from the West Bank to Gaza and to Israel's own policy of ethnic cleansing.

Shot on rooftops at night

The whole documentary is built from nighttime rooftop conversations with Israeli soldiers whose identities are hidden.

“Composed of nighttime rooftop interviews with disguised Israeli soldiers”

The perpetrators narrate

The soldiers describe what they were told to do and how they did it. No outside narrator is needed when the people carrying out war crimes walk you through the method.

“those committing war crimes explain their orders and the methods by which they're carried out”

The old fight was not about the film

When No Other Land won at Berlin and then the Oscar, the uproar had little to do with what was on screen. It arrived four months after October 7th, into a fight already underway.

“tensions were high, misinformation was rife”

No revelations, just discomfort

Documentaries had already named Israel's official policy of ethnic cleansing. What made the film combustible was timing, plus decades of treating anti-Zionism as anti-Semitism.

“It was hardly the first strong documentary to call attention to Israel's official policy of ethnic cleansing, and there were no revelations to be had.”

Festivals had it both ways

Coverage marveled that Palestinian and Israeli directors could work together, while festivals professing neutrality let the program speak so they never had to.

“film festivals claiming "not to take sides" were able to hide behind their programming and have it both ways”