I’m not a big sports fan, but the meteoric rise of the Knicks [l'équipe de basket de New York, qui dispute la finale de la NBA face aux Spurs de San Antonio] is obviously changing me. In recent weeks, I have found myself checking match results, reading articles about basketball and following the sport with a passion that would surprise those who know me.
There is something wonderfully simple about sport. We choose a team. We put on her swimsuit. We support her. It’s simple.
If I think about that, it’s because my friend the filmmaker Nadav Lapid finds himself at the heart of a lively controversy at the Marseille International Film Festival [qui se tient du 7Â au 12Â juillet]because he is Israeli. The FID had invited him to be part of the jury and had also planned a special program around his work, including the screening of his films. But under pressure from other directors who threatened to withdraw their films, the FID canceled both the appearance of Nadav Lapid and the screening of his works.
Before continuing, let us recall a point which, although obvious, is often overlooked in this type of debate. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is not a symmetrical conflict. Israelis and Palestinians find themselves in unequal situations, whether in terms of power, freedoms, sovereignty and daily security. These asymmetries are real. And no political analysis can ignore this.
Individuals returned to their passport
In this conflict, both sides tend to reduce individuals from the opposing camp to the category to which they belong. Like in sports. As if the jersey mattered more than the person wearing it.
In Marseille, it seems to me that we must distinguish two things. On the one hand there was the cancellation of the programming devoted to Nadav’s films. On the other hand, the cancellation of his participation in the jury. However, we mix these two decisions as if they were one and the same thing.
Many of the directors who lobbied the festival did not want to exclude Nadav simply because he is Israeli, but because his films were partly financed by the state of Israel. For years, the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement has targeted institutions, public funding and the links of cultural production to power. However, the fact is that Nadav’s films benefited from funding from Israeli public organizations.
His latest work was supported by public funds that BDS has long denounced. Whether we validate the argument or not, we can understand that certain filmmakers are opposed to a festival honoring films financially supported by the State of Israel.
Canceling Nadav’s participation in the festival jury seems a different thing to me. The question no longer concerns the sources of financing for a film, the role of institutions or cultural policy. The question posed here is the following: is the place of this or that person within a professional and artistic space legitimate?
A target of the Israeli government
To answer this question, let’s remember this: Nadav spent a large part of his career making films that fiercely denounce Israeli nationalism, militarist culture and the conformism of society. Additionally, these films often made him a target in Israel. Nadav is regularly attacked by political leaders, condemned by public figures and accused of disloyalty – to the point that it has become a sort of routine.
Several years ago, he chose to settle in France, where he has since built his life. Isn’t it ironic that a filmmaker who has been attacking the Israeli authorities for decades is above all labeled as “Israeliâ€and for this reason ostracized? The person disappeared behind the passport.
Over the past few years, I’ve been constantly battling this kind of thinking. No, Hamas does not represent all Palestinians. No, the atrocities of October 7 do not erase the individuality and humanity of all Gazans. And I fight just as much against the opposite logic. No, Netanyahu does not represent all Israelis and not all Israelis approve of the policies of the State of Israel. And no, a person’s nationality alone does not tell us everything we need to know about that person – about their beliefs, their actions, or their moral choices.
Principles are only truly principles if we are able to benefit people who displease us. The fact that Nadav Lapid lost his place on the FID jury is not a tragedy in itself. What upsets me is more the logic underlying his ouster.
When a boycott movement remains focused on institutions, public policies and power structures, it asks difficult questions about accountability. But when he reduces an individual to his nationality, he reproduces the same thought pattern that fuels the violence he fights.
The violence in the Middle East did not start with rockets, bombs or military operations. They started well before, with the conviction that we can understand a person in terms of the group of which they are a part. The violence began when the Palestinians became Hamas and the Israelis became Netanyahu. They begin when a filmmaker is reduced to the nationality that appears on his passport.
Distinguish citizens from their government
Whatever the asymmetry between Palestinians and Israelis, it does not exempt us from preserving essential distinctions: between citizens and governments, civilians and armed combatants, individuals and the categories into which we are tempted to confine them.
I met Israelis who were brought to tears by the suffering in Gaza and Palestinians who refused to no longer see Israelis as human beings. I have met Jews and Palestinians who continue to affirm, despite all the pressure from their communities, that neither people is on the verge of disappearing, and that the future must be built on this basis. I have met artists, activists, journalists and ordinary citizens who would rather challenge the worst inclinations of their own side than devote their energy to listing the faults of the other side.
Perhaps this is why the controversy over the Marseille festival haunts me. It’s not Nadav’s ouster, or even the boycott controversy, but the speed with which a complex human being was reduced to the category to which he belongs.
The people for whom I have the most respect today are not those who give up taking a stand. These are those which remain capable of distinguishing a citizen from his government, an individual from an institution with which he may have a link, a person from his passport.
In New York, these thoughts are of no importance to Knicks fans today. And it is precisely this simplicity that makes sport beautiful: only the jersey counts.
But the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the complete opposite of a basketball match. In the Middle East, whichever team wins, the future will depend on this question: how many of us are still able to see the person behind the jersey?
