Thousands of pro-Palestinian demonstrators congregated in Venice on Saturday during the 82nd Venice International Film Festival to protest the war in Gaza.
The protest was organized by Venice4Palestine, a coalition of Italian and international film professionals.
Ahead of the march, the group said it wanted to “break the silence on the systematic violence by the Israeli army and on the complicity of governments, just as the media attention will be focused on the Film Festival.”
The week before, the group wrote an open letter to the Venice Film Festival saying, “We – activists and workers in the film, media and news fields – believe that for once, the show must stop: We must interrupt the flow of indifference and open a path to awareness.”
The letter continued, “In Venice, all the spotlight will be on the film world: We all have a duty to amplify the stories and voices of those who are being massacred.”
It also denounced what it called Israel’s “murderous attacks on film directors and crews in the West Bank,” and the alleged killing of 250 Palestinian media workers.
Withdraw invitation to Gal Gadot
“We invite those who work in film to imagine, coordinate, and implement together, during the Festival, actions that give voice to criticism of pro-Zionist government policies: a dissent expressed through creativity, thanks to our artistic, communicative, and organizational skills.”
Venice4Palestine also urged the festival to withdraw its invitations to Israeli actress Gal Gadot (Wonder Woman).
Italian actress Tecla Insolia told Corriere that excluding Gadot “is the minimum” and did not count as “discrimination.”
“It’s the minimum to ask for those who publicly support genocide,” she said.
The director of the festival, Alberto Barbera, later confirmed to Variety that Gadot would not be attending.
He also told Deadline on Sunday that he offered the protesters the opportunity to send a delegation to the red carpet, but they declined and did not enter the festival grounds.
“They didn’t want to interfere with the festival,” he said.