We are pleased to present the second annual Houston Palestine Film Festival. This exciting festival, cosponsored by The Station Museum, Rice Cinema, Museum of Fine Arts - Houston, KPFT Houston and many others, will bring cutting edge new cinema from Palestine and about Palestine. The second annual Houston Palestine Film Festival brings an honest and independent view of Palestine, its diaspora, culture and political travails through the art of film. Read more about Houston Palestine Film Festival opens 9 May
Egyptian security covertly organized for the cancellation of a week-long series of cultural events to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Nakba, or the forced expulsion of Palestinians from their homeland by Zionist forces in 1947-48. The events were planned by the Habitat International Coalition-affiliated Housing and Land Rights Network (HLRN), alongside a number of Egyptian organizations. EI contributor Serene Assir reports from Cairo. Read more about Egyptian authorities reinforce anti-Palestine campaign
In his Dutch-language book launched in the Netherlands last week, The Electronic Intifada co-founder Arjan El Fassed demonstrates how his life is deeply entwined with Palestine. Not Everyone Can Throw Stones tells the history of El Fassed’s life in the Palestinian Diaspora in a personal, moving and tense style. Contributor Adri Nieuwhof reviews for The Electronic Intifada. Read more about Book review: "Not Everyone Can Throw Stones"
It is a familiar dilemma. You are on a plane, or at a social gathering, and a stranger asks you where you are from. Your mind races to come up with an answer. If you say “Palestine,” you know that it’s not likely to be a short conversation. Bashar (Bashar Da’as), the main protagonist of Driving to Zigzigland, Nicole Ballivan’s 2006 feature film, uses a strategy to give him a measure of control with his taxi fares that support him while he looks for the perfect acting role. EI co-founder Ali Abunimah reviews. Read more about Film review: "Driving to Zigzigland"
The Chicago Palestine Film Festival committee is very excited to announce the selections and schedule for our seventh annual film festival. Our 14 selections this year come from Palestinian, American, European and other filmmakers. The festival will take place between 25 April and 8 May at the Siskel Film Center. Read more about Chicago Palestine Film Festival opens 25 April
The London Palestine Film Festival opens on 18 April and runs for two weeks, with another extraordinary selection of documentary, fiction, art, and experimental work by artists from around the world. Still the largest of its kind, this year the Festival program includes more than 50 works related to the question of Palestine by artists from across the globe working in every genre of film and video production. Read more about London Palestine Film Festival opens 18 April
When I think of cinema in Ramallah, I think of Esther Jallad. She and her family were expelled from their wealthy home in the port city of Jaffa in 1948 and found themselves in the hilly village of Ramallah. In her displacement, Esther carried one passion with her: she loved to go to the movies. She lived conveniently, next to one of the three cinemas in Ramallah, Cinema Dunia. Raja Shehadeh remembers a woman whose life imitated art, and a lost Palestinian past. Read more about In memory of Esther: Cinema Dunia
Four comedians recently came together in Houston, Texas “to promote peace through comedy” under the banner of the Israeli-Palestinian Comedy Tour. However, rather than promoting a just end to the conflict, their material exploits it in a disturbing manner. “We rely on the conflict; peace would ruin our show,” co-founder Ray Hanania said in an interview with EI contributor Sousan Hammad. Read more about Nothing to laugh at here
Last weekend, Catholics in Nazareth and around the world celebrated the most holy and significant events to Christianity, Good Friday and Easter Sunday, marking the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, a man in Biblical times known simply as “Jesus of Nazareth.” However, today Nazareth faces a slow and painful death in the face of land theft and colonization. Christine Bro writes for EI. Read more about Nazareth, the neglected city of Jesus
Jeff Halper’s new book is, in part, the story of the evolution of a “white moderate” peace campaigner to a radical Israeli campaigner for justice for the Palestinians. En route, he maps his development from “ethnic Jew to Jewish national to Israeli,” disregarding his grandmother’s warning that “Israel is no place for a Jewish boy!” Raymond Deane reviews for EI. Read more about Book Review: "An Israeli In Palestine Resisting Dispossession, Redeeming Israel"
