Arabic version: فيلم «فلسطين 36» يصل إلى القائمة المختصرة للأوسكار بعد حظره في القدس

According to ABC News, Annemarie Jacir’s historical epic Palestine 36 reached the shortlist for the 2026 Academy Awards’ Best International Feature Film category after a screening at Jerusalem’s Yabous Cultural Centre was shut down and future screenings were prohibited. The film is now screening in Australian cinemas.

Written and directed by Jacir, the film portrays the 1936-39 Palestinian revolt against British colonial rule. Its interconnected stories include a young Arab drawn into armed rebellion, farmers under siege, a journalist, a British representative and Palestinian children born into violence. Jacir said the period was critical for understanding events that followed, including the Nakba and 1948.

Production was halted weeks before filming was due to begin in Palestine in 2023, following the October 7 Hamas terrorist attack on Israel. Jacir relocated to Jordan for additional scenes, then returned to Palestine a year later to complete shooting. She resisted moving a key Jerusalem sequence to Cyprus, Greece or Malta, saying the city held a meaning beyond its appearance as an old city.

Palestine 36 is the only feature film shot in the country in the past two years, ABC News reported. It premiered at the 2025 Toronto International Film Festival to a 20-minute standing ovation and later won Best Film at the Tokyo International Film Festival. Jacir said the production was especially difficult because the cast and crew were filming violence while real violence was taking place around them.

Jacir said the Jerusalem ban was unexpected because the film focuses on a Palestinian village and British brutality, while also addressing political Zionism and its wider context. She described the film as a collective story rather than one centred on a single protagonist, saying its message concerns the power and agency of a unified people.