The Tunisian director of The Voice of Hind Rajab has declined to accept an award this week at the Berlin International Film Festival, after an Israeli general was honoured at the event.
Filmmaker Kaouther Ben Hania chose not to receive the Most Valuable Film prize at the Cinema for Peace gala on Monday, which runs alongside the Berlinale, leaving the award behind.
In remarks delivered on stage, Ben Hania said she felt a responsibility rather than gratitude, using the moment to call for justice and accountability for Hind Rajab, a five-year-old Palestinian girl who was killed by Israeli soldiers in Gaza in 2024. Two paramedics who attempted to reach her were also shot dead.
“Justice means accountability. Without accountability, there is no peace,” Ben Hania said.
“The Israeli army killed Hind Rajab; killed her family; killed the two paramedics who came to save her, with the complicity of the world’s most powerful governments and institutions,” she added. “I refuse to let their deaths become a backdrop for a polite speech about peace. Not while the structures that enabled them remain untouched.”
Ben Hania concluded by saying she would not take the award home, leaving it behind “as a reminder”, adding that she would accept it “with joy” only when peace is pursued as a legal and moral obligation, rooted in accountability for genocide.
The filmmaker later described Hind’s death as “not an exception”, but part of what she called a broader genocide, criticising political leaders who characterise mass civilian deaths as “self-defence” or the result of “complex circumstances”.
“Peace requires justice and accountability, not glossy slogans,” she said.
The Voice of Hind Rajab is based on the true story of Hind, who was trapped in her family’s car on January 2024, after it came under Israeli army fire in Gaza city. Her body was discovered nearly two weeks later, following days of uncertainty.
Hind had been travelling with relatives while fleeing fighting in northern Gaza, according to the Palestine Red Crescent. The film centres on an audio recording of Hind’s final phone call to emergency services, in which she pleads for help. The incident drew international criticism after reports that Israel initially denied responsibility for her death.
Ben Hania’s protest comes amid growing tensions at the Berlinale over its handling of the Israel-Gaza war. Festival director Tricia Tuttle has rejected accusations of censorship following an open letter signed by dozens of actors, directors and writers accusing the festival of “institutional silence” on what they described as the genocide of Palestinians.
Among the signatories are Javier Bardem and Tilda Swinton, who criticised the festival for taking clear positions on conflicts in Iran and Ukraine while remaining muted on Gaza. Tuttle said claims that the festival had been “silencing” or “intimidating” filmmakers were untrue, describing the issue as deeply troubling but also “complex”.
“I really call on Israel to make sure that they obey international law,” she said, adding that Israel’s partners also had a responsibility to protect civilian life. However, she warned against framing the issue as strictly pro-Palestine or pro-Israel, saying it oversimplified one of the most polarising debates of the moment.
“For the festival to make pronouncements is dangerous,” she said.
She also criticised the way comments by jury president Wim Wenders had been handled. Wenders said filmmakers should “stay out of politics”, and her remarks prompted further backlash and additional open letters signed by figures including Mark Ruffalo, Ken Loach and The Zone of Interest producer James Wilson.
As of February 18, the latest letter has been signed by 93 current and former Berlinale participants, calling on the festival to refuse what it describes as complicity in violence against Palestinians and to take a clearer moral stance on Gaza.
