Smotrich pushes to withdraw funding from Tel Aviv Cinemateque over ‘extremist’ films

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich takes steps to kick off the process of withdrawing government funding from the Tel Aviv Cinematheque over allegations that it had screened “extremist” films during a recent Solidarity Festival.

Writing to Justice Minister Yariv Levin, Smotrich requests that he appoint a representative to a special committee to examine the cinema’s budget under the so-called Nakba law, a measure aimed at punishing organizations deemed disloyal to Israel.

The law allows the government to withhold funding from organizations or events that present Israel’s establishment as a Nakba, or “catastrophe,” according to the Palestinian narrative.

Smotrich’s missive to Levin follows Culture Minister Miki Zohar’s request that he examine the possibility of denying funding based on the films screened at the arthouse theater as part of the festival.

Zohar wrote in a letter to Smotrich that the annual festival screened films that could be described as “extremist,” claiming it included movies that opposed the State of Israel, slandered IDF soldiers and the army, and aimed to strengthen the Palestinian identity of Arab residents of mixed Jewish-Arab cities in Israel.

Zohar asked Smotrich to examine whether the Tel Aviv Cinematheque violated any provisions of the budget law, which could then allow the denial of its state funding.

After being convened, the committee examining whether or not to cut the cinema’s funding would have 60 days to submit its recommendation to the government.

Then-culture minister Miri Regev weighed withdrawing funds from the Tel Aviv Cinematheque in 2018 over a festival about the Nakba.