Finally, is the first thought, the local film scene is finally speaking out about Hamas terror in Israel and anti-Semitism in Germany. More than 550 German-speaking filmmakers have now signed a statement published on artechock.de on November 9th, the 85th anniversary of Kristallnacht. This also includes the directors Doris Dörrie, Dominik Graf, Sherry Hormann, Christoph Hochhäusler, Caroline Link, Edgar Reitz and David Wnendt as well as Constantin boss Martin Moszkowicz and the film academy managing director Maria Köpf.
“We stand in unconditional solidarity with all Jews in the world who are threatened with life and limb,” it says in the open letter. The signatories condemn the terrorist attack by Hamas “without ifs and buts” and “unreservedly support the right to exist of the State of Israel guaranteed by the UN and the right to self-defense.”
The statement, which was also signed by numerous actors such as Meret Becker, Iris Berben, Burghart Klaußner and Hanns Zischler, ends with dismay at the rise of anti-Semitic forces that are putting the lives of Jews in danger in Germany. This should not happen anywhere in the world, especially not “in the country that was responsible for the Shoah”.
These are clear words that one would have wished had not been made public until a month after the terrorist attack and the anti-Israel pro-Palestine demonstrations that promptly followed. Previous reactions from the film community in this country sounded significantly different. At the end of October, students from the German Film and Television Academy Berlin (DFFB) condemned the Israeli government’s “genocide” in the Gaza Strip and the “ethnic cleansing in the occupied West Bank” in a statement. There were demands for an immediate ceasefire and an “end to police violence” and the alleged suppression of freedom of expression in Germany. Hamas terror was not mentioned.
On November 1st, a statement supported by almost 2,000 international, albeit less prominent, filmmakers and curators quite bluntly called for a boycott of the Oberhausen Short Film Festival. Or at least a distancing from the festival and its director Lars Henrik Gass on the part of the international community. On the Short Film Festival’s Facebook page, Gass encouraged people to take part in the Berlin Israel rally on October 22nd. “Show the world that the Neukölln Hamas fans and Jew-haters are in the minority,” wrote Gass.
The protest note against him accuses him of “dehumanizing and stigmatizing” the Palestinians. His call is a “dangerous demonization of anyone who shows solidarity with the Palestinian liberation movement.” As in the statement from the DFFB students, the community is called upon to advocate for an immediate ceasefire and to defend the right to support the Palestinian cause.
Something similar happened at the international level at the Amsterdam Film Festival (November 8-19), the largest international documentary film festival. Hundreds of people and cultural institutions called for a boycott of the festival after its management apologized for activists chanting the anti-Israel slogan “From the river to the sea” at the opening. Palestine will be free” had shown on the podium. The boycott petition speaks of censorship of the Palestinian liberation movement. According to information from the Guardian, twelve filmmakers have withdrawn their works from the current festival edition.
In Oberhausen, festival director Gass responded immediately to criticism of his Facebook post. On the Short Film Festival website, he said that he did not want to stigmatize Palestinians and that he regrets that this impression arose. But he remains sad, empathetic and horrified by Hamas’ terror. And he wants the festival to remain a “place of free thought and discussion”: Nobody should feel excluded because of their attitude or their origins.
Keeping such freedom for dialogue open or even making it possible is incredibly difficult, especially these days. They are indispensable for democracy: places where there is interest in the arguments of others and where differences of opinion on the Middle East conflict can be resolved without the other side being accused of what they have not said or written. And where anti-Semitism, hate speech and glorification of violence have no place.