Hollywood movement to boycott Israeli film industry may wind up being counterproductive

Hannah Einbinder said “Free Palestine!” at part of her acceptance speech at this year’s Emmy Awards.

Sometimes art is a mirror. Sometimes it’s a window.

But what happens when we avoid facing that reflection? When we draw a curtain obscuring that view?

I’ve been thinking about this recently as more and more artists opposed to the war in Gaza have come out against appearing at Israeli film festivals or working with Israeli companies.

In Hollywood, some 4000 people in the industry, from Emma Stone to Mark Ruffalo, recently vowed not to “screen films, appear at, or otherwise work with Israeli film institutions — including festivals, cinemas, broadcasters and production companies — that are implicated in genocide and apartheid against the Palestinian people.”

Exactly how a film festival or movie theater implicates itself in mass murder isn’t spelled out in the statement. But the signatories are standing firm.

“I cannot work with someone who justifies or supports the genocide,” Javier Bardem declared flatly on the Emmy’s red carpet, wearing a kaffiyeh over his black suit. “We ask for a commercial and diplomatic blockade and also sanctions on Israel to stop the genocide.”

And just as some people have refused to work with or support Israeli institutions, other institutions have refused to feature Israeli filmmakers and films.

A poster for “The Road Between Us: The Ultimate Rescue.”

A pro-Palestinian group demanded the Venice Film Festival disinvite Israeli-American actress Gal Gadot, who had a movie screening there. (Ultimately, Gadot did not appear, although a spokesperson said she had never actually RSVP’d.) The Toronto Film Festival cancelled the showing of “The Road Between Us: The Ultimate Rescue,” a Canadian documentary about the Oct. 7 attacks. (Eventually rescheduled, the film ended up winning an audience award.)

Judging by the number of pins and protests at events — “Free Palestine!” Hannah Einbinder said, after picking up her Supporting Actress Emmy for “Hacks” — the movement is only growing.

But who does it really serve?

There is no question that artists take a righteous stand when they oppose racist institutions. In 1964, the Beatles refused to appear at Florida’s Gator Bowl unless the audience was integrated — a clause they then inserted in all their American contracts. In 1985, Steven Van Zandt’s anti-apartheid anthem “Sun City” was a rallying cry for musicians boycotting the lush resort in Bophuthatswana, South Africa’s fake “homeland” for Blacks.

In the end, though, those were really calls to broaden the audience, not restrict it. But who is an artist reaching, ultimately, when they decide not to reach out at all?

To be clear, my question here isn’t about how best to end the bloodshed in the Middle East. I’m too smart to think I know more about that conflict than anyone else (and I assume you’re too smart to be reading a film critic looking for those answers).

I agree with, I think, the vast majority of people that the hostages have to be released, the violence has to end, and that there has to be a solution that allows everyone to peacefully pursue their lives. I don’t think there’s anyone — except perhaps some extremists in power, on both sides — who wants anything less.

My question is how do Western artists not attending Israeli film festivals — or Western film festivals not wanting Israeli artists to attend — really move anyone any closer to peace? Isn’t it better to meet and exchange ideas? To try to build some understanding?

If you truly have something to say, isn’t saying it as clearly and calmly as you can better than sticking to a principled silence?

The irony is that, in many ways, Israel is more accepting of wide-open debate than America is. The daily newspaper Haaretz is far more critical of the Israeli government, and the Gaza war, than any paper in the states. For years, Israeli filmmakers have openly explored subjects — the traumatic war in Lebanon, the delicate détente between Israeli Arabs and Jews, the daily stress and strife of life in the West Bank — that even the most progressive of Hollywood filmmakers would never think of tackling.

So why wouldn’t you want to engage with these people?

“We are the industry that (has been) struggling for years, making efforts for decades to promote discussion,” Tzvika Gottlieb, CEO of the Israeli Film & TV Producers Association, recently told the Associated Press. “This call for a boycott is profoundly misguided. By targeting us — the creators who give voice to diverse narratives and foster dialogue — these signatories are undermining their own cause and attempting to silence us.”

Liat Benasuly, an Israeli producer, also called the boycott counterproductive.

“I’m extremely left, and I can’t emphasize how much I’m against this horrible government,” Benasuly told The Hollywood Reporter. “My friends and all the artists here are like me. We are trying to change our reality — and (the signatories) are trying to silence our voices, our art, as we try to speak about this complex situation. This just helps this government, who’d prefer we were silent, too.”

I understand protests, and pleas for peace. Everyday Israelis have been protesting, and pleading, forever. I also understand calls for economic boycotts, or moves to restrict military aid.

But what do all-out artistic boycotts accomplish? And if they were truly effective, why hasn’t there been a comparable movement in Hollywood to cease all collaborations with, say, China — a government that openly represses unions, stifles free speech and imprisons ethnic minorities, and has actively harassed and even imprisoned writers and artists?

Is it that Beijing’s crimes are lesser? Or that the money to be made by collaborating with it is so much greater?

Artistic boycotts not only deprive audiences of an ever-more necessary window into other people’s lives. They also hold up a mirror to the people participating in them — and may reveal a reflection they don’t particularly want to see.

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