As part of a new series titled Palestinian Stories, works by critically-acclaimed Palestinian filmmakers including Elia Suleiman, Annemarie Jacir, and Basil Khalil are arriving on Netflix this October.
Khalil’s 2015 Oscar-nominated short film Ave Maria is just one of the titles made available by the streaming platform, along with Jacir’s Salt of This Sea and Suleiman’s Divine Intervention.
Other works on the list are: A Drowning Man; Frontiers of Dreams and Fears; A Man Returned; When I Saw You; Children of Shatila; The Crossing; Paradise Now; Chronicle of a Disappearance; Maradona's Legs; 3000 Nights; In Vitro; Bonbone; Three Logical Exists; and Ghost Hunting.
“The diversification of our content sits close to my heart as Netflix works to become the home of Arabic cinema, a place where anyone in the world can access great Arab stories,” says Nuha El Tayeb, director of content acquisitions for Turkey, Middle East, and North Africa at Netflix. “While these stories are distinctly and authentically Arab, the themes are quintessentially human, and will resonate with audiences across the world. That is the true beauty of storytelling.”
Meanwhile, a selection of Palestinian movies and docs are already available on the streaming platform, including The Present, Eyes of a Thief, and Born In Gaza.
Read our introduction to Palestinian women’s cinema by open source digital archive and curatorial platform, and Dazed 100ers, Habibi Collective.
Palestinian Stories will be available on Netflix from October 14