Oscar-winning Palestinian filmmaker and activist Basel Adra said soldiers from the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) searched his house in the occupied West Bank after a group of Israeli settlers attacked him, his family members and a foreign activist on Saturday.
On Saturday afternoon, a group of settlers from the illegal Havat Ma’on outpost near Adra’s village of At-Tuwani began trespassing in his olive grove, Adra told CNN.
When Adra, two of his brothers, his cousin and a foreign activist attempted to confront the settlers, they were attacked, Adra said.
“The police, the army came when the settlers were attacking us,” Adra said. “They did not stop them. One of the settlers chased one of the solidarity activists, and he beat her on the ground. The soldiers were watching, didn’t do anything.”
Adra said that one of his brothers was run over by a settler riding an ATV and had to be hospitalized.
After the attack, the IDF “invaded” At-Tuwani, Adra said, searching his house for twenty minutes and looking through his wife’s phone. The army also blocked the village road to an ambulance, Adra added.
“We’ve filed dozens of complaints against these same settlers for grazing their sheep among our olive trees,” Adra said. “We bring the police, and they do nothing.”
CNN has reached out to the mayor of the regional council that includes Havat Ma’on for comment. The IDF told CNN in a statement that they had deployed to At-Tuwani after they received a report “regarding several terrorists who hurled rocks at Israeli civilians adjacent to At-Tuwani.”
“As a result of the rock hurling, two Israeli civilians were injured and evacuated to receive medical treatment,” the IDF wrote. “Upon receiving the report, the security forces were dispatched to the scene and are currently conducting searches in the area and questioning suspects.”
Adra denied that anyone in his group threw rocks, calling the allegation “bullshit.”
“They were attacking us on private land,” Adra said of the settlers.
A March report by activist groups Peace Now and Kerem Navot and verified by CNN satellite analysis found that settlers established 49 new illegal shepherding outposts between October 7, 2023, and December 2024, an increase of 50%.
The outposts, which are illegal under both Israeli and international law, are often founded by the most extreme Israeli settlers.
Last year, Adra and three other filmmakers won an Oscar for their documentary “No Other Land,” which chronicled the forced displacement of Palestinians in the West Bank area of Masafer Yatta.
It isn’t the first time that the filmmakers have been attacked since winning their award. In March, Adra’s co-director on the film Hamdan Ballal was detained by Israeli forces overnight after being assaulted by settlers just after an iftar dinner during Ramadan.
At the time, an activist who witnessed Ballal’s assault told CNN that such attacks are a regular occurrence.
“They don’t always involve an Oscar-winning filmmaker,” he said.
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