We express our concern about the Doc Edge 2022 Festival decision to partner with the Israeli embassy in New Zealand and to officially list them as a ‘supporter’. The Palestinian community approached Doc Edge Festival Directors and asked them to remove the Israeli Embassy as an official ‘Supporter’. The festival rejected our request.

Hence, we have no choice but to call the public and the filmmaker participants to stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people and with the right of all indigenous people to sovereignty and liberation, and to boycott the festival.

Doc Edge has the Israeli Embassy in New Zealand listed as a supporter, at a time when Israel is unlawfully occupying Palestinian territory, subjugating Palestinians to a catalogue of human rights abuses. Just recently, video footage, eyewitness testimony and independent investigations found Israeli Occupation Forces responsible for the deliberate murder of American Palestinian journalist Shireen Abu Akleh and for attacking her funeral. Furthermore, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, The Harvard Law School, and even the Israeli human rights organisation B’Tselem have each identified Israel as an apartheid state. It is very hurtful seeing a cultural institution in New Zealand accepting support from an apartheid regime, especially given Aotearoa’s history of supporting the boycott of apartheid South Africa in the 1970s. Apartheid was wrong then and it is wrong now.

While we understand the enormous effort and achievement of bringing a film to a festival audience, we hope and ask that filmmakers will reconsider your participation in Doc Edge festival and withdraw in solidarity.

Doc Edge partnering with the apartheid regime of Israel is an attempt to art wash and deflect from its daily violence and crimes against Palestinians.

ENDS

About Palestinians in Aotearoa Co-ordinating Committee (PACC)

We are an inclusive group of Palestinians from a wide range of backgrounds and diverse experiences. We are non-denominational, independent, and politically unaffiliated in Aotearoa New Zealand, Palestine, or internationally. We promote respect for others, non-discrimination, equality, and social justice.

Our mission is to provide opportunities for the diverse Palestinian community in Aotearoa to participate in all aspects of the cultural, social, and political life in New Zealand, as well as provide opportunities for New Zealanders from all walks of life to engage with Palestinian experiences, perspectives, and culture. Our mission includes advocating for Palestinian human rights and enhancing relationships with Iwi, government ministers, human rights organisations, news agencies, social media, and the wider public in New Zealand.

pacc@pacc.nz

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