Miami Beach mayor calls for cinema lease to be revoked for screening Oscar-winning Palestinian-Israeli documentary

Miami Beach Mayor Steven Meiner is pushing to revoke a cinema’s lease and cut city funding after it screened No Other Land, an Oscar-winning documentary on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the occupied West Bank. In a newsletter sent to local people on Tuesday night, Meiner criticised the film as “one-sided propaganda” and argued that it misrepresents Jewish people. However, despite his efforts to halt screenings, O Cinema continued to show the documentary.

Meiner is now introducing legislation to terminate the theatre’s lease at the old City Hall and withdraw two city grants totalling over $79,000, half of which has already been paid.

Last week, Meiner urged O Cinema CEO Vivian Marthell to cancel the screenings, referencing concerns from Israeli and German officials.

“Due to concerns over anti-Semitic rhetoric, we have decided to withdraw the film from our programming,” Marthell wrote to Meiner on 6 March. “This film has exposed a rift that prevents us from fulfilling our mission of fostering thoughtful conversations about cinematic works.”

According to Meiner’s newsletter, Marthell reversed her decision the following day. Amid the controversy, ticket sales surged, leading to sold-out showings and additional screenings.

“Our decision to screen No Other Land is not a declaration of political alignment,” said Marthell in an email to the Herald. “It is a bold reaffirmation of our belief that every voice deserves to be heard, especially when it challenges us.”

Meiner’s move has sparked a backlash, with critics accusing him of censorship. He defended his stance, stating: “Normalising hate and spreading anti-Semitism in a taxpayer-funded facility — after O Cinema itself acknowledged concerns over anti-Semitic rhetoric — is unacceptable and should not be tolerated.”

READ: UN Rapporteur Albanese says ‘ethnic cleansing’ is happening in occupied West Bank

City Commissioner David Suarez supports Meiner’s proposal, calling No Other Land “pro-Hamas propaganda”. Fellow Commissioner Kristen Rosen Gonzalez, while saying that the film is biased, opposes revoking O Cinema’s lease, warning of costly legal battles. She suggested that the theatre could also screen Screams Before Silence, a documentary about Israeli women attacked by Hamas.

The city commission will vote on Meiner’s proposal next Wednesday.

Palestinian-Israeli film No Other Land won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature at the Academy Awards earlier this month. The film was produced by a Palestinian-Israeli collective and follows the story of a Palestinian activist who befriends an Israeli journalist to help him in his plight for justice as his village in Masafar Yatta comes under attack as a result of Israel’s occupation of the area. It is the directorial debut of Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor, who described it as an act of resistance on the path to justice.

Taking to the stage at the Oscar ceremony, Adra said: “About two months ago, I became a father and my hope to my daughter is that she will not have to live the same life that I have to live now, always fearing settler violence, home demolitions and forcible displacement that my community, Masafar Yatta, is living and facing every day under the Israeli occupation.”

His words were met with loud applause from the star-studded audience.

Abraham added: “When I look at Basel, I see my brother, but we are unequal. We live in a regime where I am free, under civilian law, and Basel is under military laws that destroy his life and he cannot control. There is a different path. A political solution without ethnic supremacy.”

The documentary was filmed over four years between 2019 and 2023. It has won a number of accolades aside from the Oscar, including the Panorama Audience Award for Best Documentary Film and the Berlinale Documentary Film Award at the 2024 Berlin International Film Festival.

The power of cinema: From No Man’s Land to No Other Land