Israeli biopic about lawyer who represents Palestinians shortlisted for Oscars
‘Advocate,’ a documentary on Lea Tsemel, has won international critical acclaim but is deeply controversial back home
A biopic about an Israeli attorney who has defended Palestinian terror suspects is on the shortlist for the Academy Award in the documentary feature category, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced Monday.
“Advocate” follows the story of Lea Tsemel, an attorney who represents Palestinian clients including civil rights activists as well as suspected terrorists — most recently Arafat Irfaiya, who is on trial for the brutal rape and murder of 19-year-old Ori Ansbacher in a Jerusalem forest in February.
The controversial movie — directed by Rachel Leah Jones and Philippe Bellaiche — is one of the 15 films shortlisted for the prize.
“Incitement,” an Israeli documentary about Yigal Amir, who murdered prime minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995, didn’t make the cut.
The Academy is expected to announce the five final contenders next month.
While “Advocate” has received international critical acclaim and has won top prizes at the Krakow, Hong Kong, and Thessaloniki festivals, along with Tel Aviv’s documentary film festival Docaviv, it has caused deep political controversy in its home country and has been lashed by Culture Minister Miri Regev as well as right-wing groups and organizations representing families of terror victims.
Following a pressure campaign from a group of bereaved families, Israel’s state lottery company, Mifal HaPayis, announced in June that it was pulling its funding for future grants given to Docaviv best picture winners after “Advocate” was awarded the prize.
According to the Choosing Life Forum, a group for bereaved families that partnered with the right-wing Im Tirzu activist group, hundreds of Israelis throughout the country canceled their memberships with Mifal HaPayis as a result of Choosing Life’s pressure campaign on social media. The group also protested outside the firm’s Tel Aviv headquarters, pouring red paint symbolizing blood on the entrance of the building.
In awarding the film, Docaviv judges wrote that “Advocate” was “a thought-provoking project that addresses an important subject and demonstrates impressive cinematic skills, especially the innovative and intelligent use of animation… [It] sketches out a complex portrait of a strong and inspiring woman who believes in the justness of her path with all her heart.”
The film follows two cases from the past few years in which Tsemel, 74, represented Palestinians eventually convicted of terrorism.
One is the case of Ahmed Manasra, who was convicted of the attempted murder of two Israelis in a stabbing attack in Jerusalem in October 2015, when he was 13 years old, and is currently serving a 9.5-year prison sentence.
Manasra carried out the attack with his 15-year-old cousin Hassan Manasra. The two stabbed and seriously wounded a 20-year-old man and a 13-year-old boy in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Pisgat Zeev. Hassan Manasra was shot dead by security forces, while Ahmed Manasra was hit by a car as he fled.
The second case is that of Israa Jaabis, a Palestinian woman from East Jerusalem who detonated explosives in her car near Jerusalem in 2015, with a gas canister failing to explode.
Tsemel herself is a longtime political activist for the Palestinian nationalist Balad party, the most extreme of the four parties that currently make up the Joint List. She has been featured on the party’s electoral slate — in non-realistic, symbolic positions — six times in the last 20 years, including in the two elections this year.
Jacob Magid contributed to this report.
