Palestinian Filmmaker Rashid Masharawi announced that he established a fund to support filmmakers in his city, Gaza.
In an interview with Asharq Al-Awsat, he said the Palestinian cinema has affected the Palestinian cause and promoted it in international festivals. He also said that he is currently making the final touches on a new feature film which he shot in Palestine before the war. He is also preparing a documentary inspired by the ongoing war.
Masharawi slammed the suspension of Arab film festivals and hailed the “Window on Palestine” program, which he was keen to attend at Egypt’s Gouna Film Festival.
The Palestinian filmmaker believes that the film festivals are platforms of culture, awareness and promotion of art, and that they must keep going despite the war. “The cinema is highly important to support people and highlight their culture and identity anywhere,” he said.
About the films screening as part of the “Window on Palestine” program at the Gouna Festival, he said: “I liked their diversity, features and documentaries, and the variety of the covered topics,” noting that “it’s very important, especially during this time, to present a different image of Palestine.”
Masharawi assures that “the aggression didn’t start on October 7, but 75 years ago. These facts are presented in films more than in the news. These films should be screened so the Arab and western audiences know the truth.”
Masharawi is the first Palestinian filmmaker who made features and documentaries inside the occupied Palestinian territories, including “Laila’s Anniversary”, “Falastine Stereo” and “Letters from Yarmouk.”
The director believes that the Palestinian cinema has served the cause of his country, noting that “it has certainly highlighted the cause and affected a large audience inside and outside Palestine, especially some works that partook in international festivals qualified by their artistic value, not only their political view.”
Masharawi, who has been working in filmmaking for 40 years, said: “I know how us, filmmakers, work on an identity that cannot be occupied. Our identity is emphasized by history, language, culture and traditions, which are all highlighted in cinema. The occupation kills people and destroys buildings, but it’s hard to erase an identity.”
The Palestinian director, who lives between France and Palestine, revealed that he “established a fund to support cinema and filmmakers in Gaza,” noting that “this is the first time I talk about the fund aimed at creating and helping a new generation of young filmmakers in Gaza, who have myriads of stories that they lived during the war. I also promise to make a documentary inspired by the war in Gaza. Many cinematographers are already working on it.”
He added that he has many projects that he still didn’t reveal, noting that the “Gaza fund” is a continuation of his project to support the Palestinian cinema, which he started years ago to train young filmmakers.
As a Gazan, he knows well the disasters that war has caused and how much of his favorite places it has destroyed. “The cultural center I built and our houses were demolished, we lost family members, friends and neighbors, but we are ashamed of talking about them because death has affected everybody. I live the war like if I was there, like if the bombs hit me every day although I am not in Gaza,” he explained.
Before the war, he wrote a script of a feature film that anticipates what’s happening right now. “The film ends with a bloody war in Gaza. I wrote it before the outbreak of this ongoing, unstoppable war,” he said.
Masharawi is currently making final touches on his film “Ephemeral Dreams”, which he finished before the war. It tells the story of a Palestinian boy who lost a bird, and then embark on a journey from Bethlehem to Jerusalem and Jaffa to find it. He passes by checkpoints and a wall, witnessing the tragedies inflicted by the occupation. The film will be ready for display within two months, he concluded.
