The Japan Times - Hadid sister helps launch Palestinian film streaming site

Watermelon+ was launched at the Cannes film festival as more than 100 people were killed in Israeli strikes on Gaza on Thursday. At least 80 died on Wednesday.

"Unless we get (Palestinian) voices out there, nothing's going to change," said Badie Ali, one of two US-born Palestinian brothers who founded the website, where Hadid is creative director.

A model and activist, her father, property developer Mohamed Anwar Hadid, is Palestinian.

Showing "neglected or silenced" Palestinian perspectives was particularly important in the United States, an ally of Israel, Ali insisted.

The platform offers around 60 films, including several set in Gaza.

They span from Emmy-awarded documentary "Five Broken Cameras" to "The Wanted 18", a comic true story about West Bank villagers hiding cows inside their houses from Israeli troops during the First Intifada.

Co-founder Hamza Ali said the aim was to humanise Palestinians.

"It's dehumanisation and erasure that contribute to the politics," he said.

"We're more than our suffering. We're a warm, hospitable, creative, funny people."

Israeli bombardment has killed more than 53,000 people in Gaza, according to the besieged Hamas-run territory's health ministry, and an aid blockade also threatens famine.

Israeli leaders have expressed a desire to empty the territory of its more than two million inhabitants as part of the war sparked by Palestinian militant group Hamas's October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.

The unprecedented assault resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people on the Israeli side.

President Donald Trump said on Thursday he wanted the United States to "take" Gaza and turn it into a "freedom zone". Earlier this year, he said he wanted to transform it into the "Riviera of the Middle East".

H.Takahashi--JT