Hamdan Ballal, one of the Oscar-winning directors of 'No Other Land', has been released by Israeli authorities after he was detained last night. With bruises on his face and blood on his clothes, Ballal was released from an Israeli police station in Kiryat Arba, the West Bank settlement, today. He and two other Palestinians were yesterday and then taken to a nearby hospital.
“I was blindfolded for 24 hours, Ballal said. “All the night I was freezing. It was a room, I couldn’t see anything.
.. I heard the voice of soldiers laughing about me.
” The Palestinian director said he was held in an army base and forced to sleep under a freezing air conditioner. Ballal, won at the Oscars last month for . Co-directed with fellow Palestinian director Basel Adra and Israeli director Yuval Abraham, the film shows the in the Israeli-occupied West Bank between 2019-2023.
The film’s events take place prior to the current Israel-Gaza hostilities that began with the 7 October 2023 Hamas terror attack. Yesterday, Ballal and the two other Palestinians were detained in the village of Susiya in Masafer Yatta, according to lawyer Lea Tsemel, who is representing the group. Tsemel said they received only minimal care for their injuries from the attack and that she had no access to them for several hours after their arrest.
She had earlier said they were accused of throwing stones at a young settler, allegations they deny. Basel Adra, another director of , was present at the scene. He explained.
