Palestinian actor says he can’t attend Academy Awards because of Trump’s travel ban

Palestinian actor Motaz Malhees said a travel ban imposed by the White House is preventing him from attending this weekend’s Academy Awards, whose nominees include a movie in which he has a starring role.

“The Voice of Hind Rajab,” a film about a five-year-old Palestinian girl allegedly killed by Israeli forces in Gaza in January 2024, has been Oscar-nominated for best international feature film.

Malhees, 34, who plays the role of a call center operator attempting to help her, said he cannot attend the Academy Awards show because he has been barred from entering the US.

“I am not allowed to enter the United States because of my Palestinian citizenship,” Malhees said on Instagram. The London-based Jenin native said the film’s other Palestinian cast members have citizenship that allows US travel but he only holds a Palestinian passport.

While “it hurts” he could not attend the Oscars, Malhees said, “You can block a passport. You cannot block a voice. I am Palestinian, and I stand with pride and dignity.”

In a December proclamation restricting entry of foreign nationals, US President Donald Trump said he had “determined to fully restrict and limit the entry of individuals using travel documents issued or endorsed by the Palestinian Authority.”

The proclamation restricting entry of people from some countries cited security reasons and went into effect on January 1, according to the US State Department’s website. The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The film, by Franco-Tunisian director Kaouther Ben Hania, dramatizes the effort by Palestinian Red Crescent dispatchers in the central West Bank to send Rajab assistance within Gaza, using real audio from the girl’s phone call, in which she — surrounded by dead family members — pleads for help.

Rajab and her family were fleeing Gaza City with six relatives last year when their car came under fire. Rajab, her family, and two medics who came to save them were later found dead.

The Red Crescent has accused Israel of deliberately targeting an ambulance it sent to rescue Rajab.

Israel has claimed there were no Israeli troops present in the vicinity of the vehicle where Rajab’s body was found.

A Washington Post report found that Israeli armored vehicles were, in fact, operating in the area at the time, and that the gunfire heard in the Red Crescent recordings was consistent with IDF weapons.

Israel has repeatedly accused Hamas of embedding itself in civilian infrastructure, including hospitals and ambulances, amid the war sparked in Gaza following the terror group’s onslaught in southern Israel on October 7, 2023.