Arundhati Roy Withdraws from Berlin Film Festival Over Comments on Gaza

Darwin, 14 February:

Indian author Arundhati Roy has announced that she is withdrawing from the Berlin International Film Festival following comments related to Israel’s war on Gaza. She described remarks made by members of the festival’s jury as “unconscionable.”

According to a report published Saturday by Al Jazeera, Roy wrote in an article for the Indian news outlet The Wire that she was shocked by comments from Berlinale jurors—particularly jury chairman and renowned filmmaker Wim Wenders—who said that “art should not be political.”

In her words, “Such a position is a way of silencing discussion about ongoing crimes against humanity.”

Roy, the Booker Prize–winning author of The God of Small Things, said that what has happened and continues to happen in Gaza amounts to genocide by the State of Israel against the Palestinian people. She also alleged that governments including those of the United States, Germany, and several European countries are supporting and funding the war, thereby making them complicit.

On Thursday, during the festival’s opening panel, a journalist questioned the German government’s stance and human rights issues in Gaza. In response, Wenders said that “filmmakers must stay out of politics” and that they act as a counterforce to politics through their work.

Jury member and Polish producer Ewa Puszczyńska described the question as “somewhat unfair,” saying filmmakers are not responsible for whether governments support Israel or Palestine.

Roy had been scheduled to participate in the festival because her 1989 film In Which Annie Gives It Those Ones was selected for screening in the Classics section. The Berlin International Film Festival runs from February 12 to 22.