A Palestinian visual artist and filmmaker who seemingly praised the October 7 Hamas attack was selected to design the biggest and most visible space in Oslo’s new Government Quarter, which will open in 2026.
Jumana Manna, who was raised in Jerusalem but lives in Berlin, was selected by a Norwegian jury for the project in 2022. Her proposal, which is named Sebastia and is about 800. sq. m., will be publicly accessible once it is finished.
So what is the controversy? On October 7, Manna reposted a picture on Instagram of Hamas terrorists paragliding into Israeli territory. Alongside it, she wrote “Long live the creativity of resistance.” In another post, she typed a laughing-face emoji above a photo from a video of teenagers riding bikes into Israel shortly before the Hamas attack.
Manna, however, denied that the posts celebrated terror.
In an op-ed in Hyperallergic in November 2023, she claimed that “upon hearing early news that Hamas militants breached the barrier surrounding the Gaza Strip, I shared a few stories on my Instagram page.”
Art becomes a political expression
“Seeing these borders momentarily torn down and flown over, many Palestinians were moved by the stubborn and creative will to break free from captivity,” she continued, adding, “Images of the parachute gliders appeared in our feeds alongside a tractor destroying the apartheid wall. Palestinian teenagers filmed themselves riding out on bikes and horses onto the lands from which their families were ethnically cleansed in 1948.”
“We hoped this moment of fugitivity might restore the potential for life, liberation, and dignity for all in this wretched land, for this nightmarish fantasy of one-sided normalcy to end.”
She went on to say that, at the time of sharing the stories on Instagram, “it had not become apparent that hundreds had been deliberately shot and kidnapped” and that she “regretted the comments after the news revealed the extent of the violence.”
However, her statements in media outlets continue to show a striking enmity toward any Jews who support Israel and Jews in Israel. In a May 2025 interview, she condemned “the aggressive Judaization” of Jerusalem.
She has also been critical of Germany's s policies on Israel and Jews, including motions on “Combating Antisemitism, Terrorism, Hate Speech and Hate Speech” and “Terminating the residency of antisemitic aliens and preventing their naturalization,” which she called “deeply troubling” and “part of a fierce storm of right-wing politicians making their professional debut by demonizing immigrants, or anyone they classify as non-white.”
Norwegian author Henrik Beckheim highlighted the irony of the situation: “The government building was torn down by terror. And now it is being rebuilt and adorned by a terrorist sympathizer who supports Hamas’s massacre of youth, and refers to the terror as 'creative'.”
The Norwegian government building complex in Oslo was previously destroyed by a car bomb in the 2011 terrorist attack by Anders Behring Breivik.
It is worth noting that Sebastia is named after a village in the West Bank, which some have remarked is an odd choice of art for a Norwegian government building.