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Global backing for Palestine’s causes is growing, even in the film industry, where numerous of film workers have joined a commitment to avoid Israeli film groups deemed involved in the conflict in Gaza, and high-profile celebrities are supporting films that focus on the Palestinian experience.

Yet, Palestinian films still struggle to secure distribution and achieve exposure – even after a major Academy Awards victory last year. To showcase Palestine’s rich tradition of film-making, we asked leading Palestinian film-makers and artists to discuss their top Palestinian films.

‘It Brought Me to Tears’: Mo Amer Reflects on All That’s Left Of You

Director Cherien Dabis’s film All That’s Left of You, which debuted recently at the Sundance Film Festival, is a rare cinematic work, bold and memorable. By telling the story of a one Palestinian clan, from its roots in pre-1948 the city of Jaffa through generations of displacement, it does not just tell a tale – it honors a legacy.

The visuals are vivid and immersive. Every shot feels purposeful, every frame a recollection – the orange groves of Jaffa, the roads of Nablus, the isolation of exile. The acting are powerful, showcasing Dabis’s remarkable versatility together with three generations of the Bakri family – the group of actors most synonymous with Palestinian cinema. They are layered, restrained and heartbreakingly real.

The most striking aspect is how smoothly the film shifts between different eras without ever losing its narrative thread. Every period of the Palestinian story is brought to life with stunning precision, both visually and in feeling. The filmmaking is skillful in that way, guiding you through years with precision and care.

By the end, I was moved to tears. All That’s Left of You isn’t just about the past, it’s about the invisible manners it influences who we are. It’s a movie that stays with you – not because of drama, but because of truth.

• Mo Amer is a Palestinian-American actor and comic and the maker of a popular Netflix show.

‘A Groundbreaking Masterpiece’: Cherien Dabis on Divine Intervention

A sunglasses-clad Palestinian female defiantly walks through a security post. Israeli troops look on, weapons pointed, confused. Her beauty disarms them and causes the guard tower to collapse. It’s an memorable moment from director Elia Suleiman’s Divine Intervention that has stayed with me ever since I initially watched the film. I was a second-year postgraduate film student at a university when it premiered in the US in the early 2000s. I recall being amazed by its power, its resistance, and its sheer boldness.

At a time when the majority of Palestinian cinema tended to be the serious or sad, the director carved a new path. Through satire, straight-faced performance, and near-silent observation, he portrayed the bizarre absurdity of existence under occupation. Portraying the movie’s mute main character himself, he placed his own gaze at the core of the narrative. That decision felt revolutionary. His performance was calm and understated, which only magnified the tension all around him.

Divine Intervention is both deeply personal and highly political. Its visual language is global, yet rooted in the fractured existence of Palestinian self. The filmmaker transforms disconnection, displacement and resistance into something approaching poetry. The result is touching, dreamlike, at times funny and always deeply truthful.

There was nothing similar to it in Palestinian film at the period. There still isn’t. It continues to be, for me, the most wildly original and creative Palestinian-made film ever created.

• Cherien Dabis is a Palestinian-American filmmaker, writer, producer and actress, whose most recent film is an official entry for the Academy Awards.

‘A Remarkable New Voice’: Hany Abu Assad on To a Land Unknown

For me, a great movie needs to do two things. It needs to provide an journey that’s unfamiliar, emotional and intelligent. It needs to offer me something I’ve been lacking – a point of view that contradicts my belief system, a method to think about issues outside my own life, a window to a distinct time and place. In short, I need to feel enriched, in spirit and intellectually.

Additionally, it needs to move me with its skill. A ability that is not busy seeking approval but is employed to reveal to an idea more important.

The film To a Land Unknown, which was released last year, is exactly this type of film. Made by Mahdi Fleifel, it is a tale about a pair of Palestinian companions looking for improved futures as refugees in Greece.

To a Land Unknown allowed me to experience what it’s like to be a vulnerable migrant, in a foreign land, where everything acts in opposition to your attempts to escape the slum. It demonstrated me that in some cases, even when circumstances outside your control conspire against you, you personally can still become your own worst enemy. And its dance between story and visual form floored me in its craft.

In To a Land Unknown, Palestine has found a talent that will serve its cause without shedding a one ounce of violence.

• Hany Abu-Assad is a Palestinian-Dutch director, screenwriter and twice Oscar contender for his acclaimed films.

‘It Shows Israel Views Even Cows as a Threat’: Basel Adra on The Wanted 18

One of my favorite Palestinian movies is The Wanted 18. It tells the story of Palestinian people in Beit Sahour, a town near the city of Bethlehem in the West Bank, during the initial uprising of the late 1980s. It documents their attempt to {