Israeli soldiers barred journalists from entering villages in the West Bank on Monday on a tour organized by the directors of the Oscar-winning movie “No Other Land.”
The directors of the film, which focuses on Israeli settler attacks on Palestinians in the West Bank, said they had invited the journalists on the tour to interview residents about increasing settler violence in the area.
In a video posted to X by the film’s co-director Yuval Abraham, an Israeli officer —his face concealed by a ski mask and identifiable as a major by the insignia on his uniform — was seen telling a group of international journalists that “no passage” was allowed in the area due to a military order.
“You know they are journalists. They’re coming to see the destruction in Masafer Yatta, the way you are destroying the community, the settler violence,” a voice off camera could be heard telling the officer, referring to the Palestinian village that “No Other Land” covers.
A Palestinian man was then seen telling the officer and a soldier standing with him, whose face was also covered, that the journalists were coming to his home and should be let through. But the officer refused.
“Why didn’t you prevent the settlers when they came to burn the homes… attacking people?” the man was seen telling the officer. “Why don’t you come to do this order? Why only for journalists who are holding cameras and phones?… I have so many videos of settlers coming to attack us, shooting people here, you do nothing. Why?”
Eventually, the officer told the journalists that they were being kept out due to the need “to keep the order in this area.”
Basel Adra, the Palestinian co-director of the film who lives in the area, said the military blocked the journalists from entering two Palestinian villages they had hoped to visit.
The Israel Defense Forces did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Since “No Other Land” gained notoriety, local villagers have faced an uptick in settler attacks, including in the villages of Tuba and Jinba. Hamdan Ballal, another of the film’s co-directors, was attacked by settlers and then arrested in March, drawing global condemnation.
Palestinians say the settlers operate with the tacit consent of the Israeli state, which carries out home demolitions and rarely prosecutes settlers for instances of violence against Palestinians. Locals have said the attacks are designed to intimidate them into fleeing their land.
The West Bank has seen a spike in violence since the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel sparked the war in Gaza.
In the West Bank, the military has undertaken large-scale counterterrorism operations that have killed hundreds of people — the vast majority of them combatants, according to the IDF — and displaced tens of thousands.