Israel-Palestinian film ‘No Other Land’ wins Oscar; makers call for a solution on conflict ‘without ethnic supremacy’

Israel-Palestinian documentary No Other Land, which explores Israel’s occupation of the West Bank, won the Best Documentary Feature at the 97th Academy Awards on Sunday.

The 2024 film is a collaboration between Israelis and Palestinians. It documents a collaboration between a Palestinian activist and an Israeli journalist amid their peoples' conflict on the occupied West Bank, Reuters said. 

Palestinian Basel Adra, born in 1996, and journalist Yuval Abraham, born in 1995, accepted the award at Hollywood's Dolby Theatre.

The film shows Adra resisting the forced displacement of his people by the Israeli army in the West Bank community of Masafer Yatta. It shows Israeli soldiers tearing down homes and evicting residents to create a military training zone.

Adra befriends Jewish Israeli Abraham, but the stark gap in their living conditions challenges their relationship.

In their acceptance speech at the Oscars on Sunday (US time), the filmmakers called for a different path forward to resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

‘A different path’

“There is a different path, a political solution without ethnic supremacy, with national rights for both of our people,” said Israeli Yuval Abraham in his acceptance speech.

Director Adra, on stage, said that two months ago, he became a father and that he hopes his daughter “will not have to live the same life I’m living now, always fearing settlers, violence, home demolitions and forcible displacements.”

"We call on the world to take serious actions to stop the injustice and to stop the ethnic cleansing of Palestinian people," he said.

The documentary was filmed over four years between 2019 and 2023 and wrapped production just days before Hamas launched its October 7, 2023, attack on Israel, which started the Gaza war.

"'No Other Land' reflects the harsh reality that we have been enduring for decades and still resist as we call on the world to take serious actions to stop the injustice and to stop the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people," Adra said.

Abraham said they made the film because together, their voices were stronger. 

"We see each other, the atrocious destruction of Gaza and its people, which must end, the Israeli hostages brutally taken in the crime of October 7, which must be freed,” he said.

"When I look at Basel, I see my brother, but we are unequal. We live in a regime where I am free under civilian law, and Basel is under military law that destroys his life, and he cannot control, said Abraham. "And why? Can't you see that we are intertwined? That my people can be truly safe if Basel's people are truly free and safe. There is another way. It's not too late for life, for the living," he said.

(With inputs from agencies)