Israeli filmmaker faces death threats after his speech at Berlinale 2024 is termed antisemitic

Israeli filmmaker Yuval Abraham, who won one of the top prizes at the recently concluded Berlin Film Festival, has stated that he received death threats following the speech he made at the awards gala on the last day of the festival. 

German officials are probing the alleged 'one-sided' remarks that Abraham and other winners made at the awards, condemning Israel's attack on Gaza. 

Abraham has alleged that his family members have also been threatened with physical harm. Abraham now has held off plans to return to Israel. 

In a social media post, Abraham wrote, “A right-wing Israeli mob came to my family’s home yesterday to search for me, threatening close family members who fled to another town in the middle of the night."

“I am still getting death threats and had to cancel my flight home. This happened after Israeli media and German politicians absurdly labeled my Berlinale award speech — where I called for equality between Israelis and Palestinians, a ceasefire and an end to apartheid — as ‘antisemitic’.”

Yuval Abraham, 29, was on Saturday awarded the Berlinale’s best documentary award for No Other Land, which charts the eradication of Palestinian villages in Masafer Yatta in the West Bank.

Yuval Abraham's winning speech

In Abraham’s acceptance speech, the director talked about a “situation of apartheid” and called for a ceasefire in Gaza. 

Abraham and several other filmmakers expressed solidarity with Palestine during the awards gala. It sparked an outcry in German media the following day, with several politicians alleging the speeches had been “antisemitic”.

“To stand on German soil as the son of Holocaust survivors and call for a ceasefire – and to then be labelled as antisemitic is not only outrageous, it is also literally putting Jewish lives in danger,” Abraham told the Guardian post the ceremony.

“I don’t know what Germany is trying to do with us,” he added. “If this is Germany’s way of dealing with its guilt over the Holocaust, they are emptying it of all meaning.”

Abraham's plan to return home is now on hold

The director initially planned to return to Israel the day after the closing ceremony. He changed his plans during a stop-off in Greece after he learned that Israeli media was describing his speech as antisemitic.

Meanwhile, Abraham’s Palestinian film-making partner, Basel Adra said during Saturday’s ceremony that he struggled to celebrate his film’s success while people in Gaza were “being slaughtered and massacred”. In his speech, Adra also urged Germany to cease arms exports to Israel. 

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Abraham said he was concerned for the safety of Adra, who has since returned to his village in the West Bank, which is surrounded by Israeli settlements.