Smotrich pushes to withdraw funding from Tel Aviv Cinemateque over ‘extremist’ films
Finance minister asks justice minister to help probe institution for screening alleged anti-Israel movies at recent Solidarity Festival
Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich is seeking to kick off a process of withdrawing government funding from the Tel Aviv Cinematheque, claiming it screened “extremist” films during a recent Solidarity Festival.
Writing to Justice Minister Yariv Levin Thursday, Smotrich requested that Levin appoint a representative to a special committee the finance minister is forming to examine the institution’s budget, under the so-called Nakba Law from 2011.
The law allows the government to withhold funding from organizations or events that present Israel’s establishment as a “nakba,” or “catastrophe,” as it is known in the Palestinian narrative.
The finance minister’s missive to Levin follows Culture Minister Miki Zohar’s request that Smotrich examine the possibility of denying funding to the Cinematheque based on 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,” including movies that he claimed opposed the State of Israel, slandered IDF soldiers and the army, and aimed to strengthen the Palestinian identity of Arab Israelis.
One of the films screened was “Lyd,” which reviews the events that took place in the city of Lod during the 1948 War of Independence from the Arab perspective, and includes allegations of Israeli war crimes.
Another film, “1948, Remember, Remember Not,” retelling the events of the 1948 war through Jewish and Arab voices, with footage from those times, was also recently questioned by the Culture Ministry’s Film Review Council, which warned the Haifa and Jerusalem Cinematheques not to screen the film, although it was shown during the DocAviv Film Festival at the Tel Aviv Cinematheque last year.
Zohar asked Smotrich to examine whether the Tel Aviv Cinematheque violated any provisions of the law, which could then allow the denial of 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.
The Solidarity Festival has been held at the Tel Aviv Cinematheque since 2011 and the festival has been supported by the Culture Ministry since 2021. The event focuses on human rights in Israel and the world and aims to promote peace, democracy, equality, and social justice.
The movies screened during the latest festival, on December 3-10, included films about Romanian, Danish and Kazakh human rights, along with documentaries about conscientious objectors from the IDF, Bedouin life, criminal violence in Arab society, as well as films on Israel’s alleged occupation of Palestinians, and peace-building among Arabs and Jews.
