No Other Land: Oscar-nominated West Bank feature director says films 'can be part of change'
2025-02-07
Category: entertainment

A Palestinian and an Israeli sit in a West Bank village at night.They wonder aloud whether Basel will ever be able to freely visit Yuval's home in Israel, whether Basel's village will get building permits, and whether they will one day have stability.For years, the friends have been filming the destruction of houses, a well and a school by the Israeli army after a court order declared Basel's community illegal. They tell each other they hope they will change that reality.Now, that scene has reached some of the world's biggest stages.The film it is in, No Other Land, has been nominated for an Oscar and a Bafta for best documentary feature.It follows the fight over Masafer Yatta, a community of around 20 villages, and the friendship between Basel Adra and Israeli journalist Yuval Abraham.In the film Basel is nearly detained after a protest, his father is arrested, and a soldier shoots a community member in the neck while confiscating a generator, leading to the man's paralysis and death."It's scary because yes, the film is succeeding and people are aware of it, but I don't think there is sufficient action, especially amongst those who have power to change this," Yuval told the BBC."I don't have an illusion that films are going to change the world, but I know they can change individuals, and I know that they can be part of a bigger change, and we really need this now."Basel and Yuval created the film along with Hamdan Ballal and Rachel Szor over five years.
Asked about the man who was paralysed, the IDF said its investigation had found no crime. A spokesperson said that during an operation against "illegal construction", two Palestinians had grabbed a soldier by his weapon and vest, leading to the shot.Palestinian eyewitnesses told Israeli media they were not contacted as part of the initial investigation and believed the shot was fired intentionally.Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967. Israeli settlements in the territory are considered illegal under international law, though Israel disputes this. They have expanded over the past 55 years, becoming a focal point of violence and conflicting claims over land.On 7 October 2023, Hamas attacked Israel, killing about 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages. That triggered an Israeli military campaign that has killed at least 47,500 people in Gaza, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.Since then, settler-related violence in the West Bank has increased, with 13 Palestinians killed by settlers, according to the UN. More than 850 Palestinians, many of them militants, have been killed by Israeli troops in the West Bank in the same period, the Palestinian health ministry says. The UN says 30 Israelis were killed by Palestinians in the West Bank during that timeframe.In 2024, the UN recorded about 1,420 incidents of Israeli settler violence – the highest number that reportedly led to casualties, property damage or both, since records began in 2006.Additional attacks on Palestinians had occurred since US President Donald Trump's return to power, Basel said, and the filmmakers feared it could worsen.Trump has lifted sanctions the Biden administration had placed on some settlers. The president's ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, has said Israel has a "title deed" to the West Bank and "there's no such thing" as occupation or settlements.When asked on Tuesday whether he agreed the US should recognise Israeli sovereignty over the occupied West Bank, Trump said he had yet to take a position but that he would make an announcement in four weeks' time.
The debate over Masafer Yatta began in the 1980s when Israel declared the area a closed military firing zone, meaning no one was allowed to live there.According to notes from a 1981 meeting, then-Israeli Agricultural Minister Ariel Sharon offered the military additional training areas to restrict the "expansion of the Arab villagers from the hills towards the desert".Israel argued residents previously did not live there permanently. The Palestinian population took their case to Israel's Supreme Court, arguing communities had lived there for generations and pointing to a 1945 map showing some villages.In 2022, the Supreme Court ruled in favour of Israel and allowed the demolition of homes and expulsion of more than 1,000 villagers.Scenes from the film show a bulldozer destroying a primary school, a truck pouring mud into a well, and machinery crushing a home as villagers confront the army. A girl cries, and when her mother is asked if she has any other place to go she says: "We have no other land."The documentary also records intimate human moments, like when the mother, who moves into a cave, kisses her daughter and tells her: "You're my love... Tomorrow will be a new day."
The film explores Basel and Yuval's friendship as well. Though they are around the same age and share similar values, their inequality is ever-present.While Yuval can travel freely in Israel and the West Bank, Basel cannot travel into Israel without a permit, as part of what it says are security measures. In the film, Basel laments that although he studied law, he could only find work in construction in Israel, and when he thinks about it too hard, "I feel this huge depression."The film does not shy away from the tension created by Yuval's identity, with one Palestinian asking him: "How can we remain friends, when you come here, and it could be your brother or friend who destroyed my home?"Yuval told the BBC he felt "responsibility for what is happening to Basel's community" because "at the end of the day, the fuel in the bulldozers is my tax money".Last year, Yuval faced a backlash for his acceptance speech for the best documentary award at the Berlin Film Festival, alongside Basel, in which he criticised a "situation of apartheid" and called for a ceasefire in Gaza.US filmmaker Ben Russell, who was there and wore a Palestinian keffiyeh scarf, said he stood against "genocide" in Gaza. Israel strongly denies the accusation of genocide.German Culture Minister Claudia Roth said the statements were "shockingly one-sided and characterised by a deep hatred of Israel", while Berlin Mayor Kai Wegner posted on social media that it was an "intolerable relativisation" and that "antisemitism has no place in Berlin". Israel's public broadcaster called Yuval's comments antisemitic. Yuval, who said he received death threats, told the BBC he was "very angry" at the label, which was "emptying this term of meaning at a time when antisemitism is rising on the right wing and on the left wing".He said it was "absurd" to hear the criticism when most of his family was killed in the Holocaust, adding that learning from this history "should tell us to fight against dehumanisation… no matter who is the victim".Despite winning several international awards, No Other Land is self-distributing in the US because it has not found an official distributor there – rare for a documentary which has been nominated for an Oscar.
One of the film's last scenes is from 13 October 2023, when Basel recorded a settler shooting his cousin, whose hands appear empty, in the stomach. In other footage, settlers throw rocks at homes while soldiers watch.The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said the shooting case was transferred to the state attorney's office, which the BBC approached for comment.Currently in Masafer Yatta, Basel said settlers have "unlimited power" and there is a "daily level of harassment".He said there were three major settler attacks in January, including on a 72-year-old taken to hospital after he was hit in the head with sticks, and around 15 people arrested in the two days before 30 January while grazing their sheep or chasing away settlers' sheep. Israel Police did not reply to a BBC request for comment.The UK has sanctioned three settler outposts and four organisations it says are supporting violence against West Bank communities. Yuval called on the UK to sanction all settlers, believing that would "truly be a deterrent".A foreign office spokesperson told the BBC the foreign secretary "has been clear with Israeli ministers that they must clamp down on settler violence and end settlement expansion"."We have regularly taken action against settler violence, including through targeted sanctions, and will continue to do all we can to ensure the rights of Palestinians are protected and that those responsible for violence are held to account," the statement read.Yuval said: "I really believe there is no other way forward, other than reaching a just, fair political solution where Palestinians can be free, truly free, and our people, both of them, will have security and self-determination."It really makes me angry, not only that my government is going in the other way, but that the world is allowing it to happen for so long."In the film, Basel recalls a seven-minute visit by Tony Blair to his village – after which Israel cancelled demolition orders there."This is a story about power," he says.Now, Basel gets "strength and power from the people around me", making him want to not give up."One water drop doesn't make change," he says during a protest in the film, "but keep dropping the water and it will make change."