Juliette Binoche, Joaquin Phoenix, Pedro Pascal, Guillermo del Toro Among New Names To Sign Letter Condemning Industry Silence Over Gaza

Juliette Binoche, Pedro Pascal, Riz Ahmed, Joaquin Phoenix and Guillermo del Toro have come forth to add their names to a letter condemning the film industry for its “passivity” and “silence” over Israel’s continued barbarity in Gaza.

Published on the festival’s first day, the letter also called out Israel’s killing of Fatma Hassona, the protagonist of “Put Your Soul In Your Hand And Walk”, a doc by exiled Iranian director Sepideh Farsi screened at Cannes’ ACID sidebar section. Just two days after the film’s selection was announced, news came in of Hassona, a 25-year-old photo journalist, being killed in an airstrike that hit her home in northern Gaza and also claimed the lives of ten members of her family. The Israeli military stated it was targeted at a Hamas member involved in attacks on Israeli civilians and soldiers. In its review of the documentary, The Hollywood Reporter wrote, "Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk is ultimately less a documentary exposé than a piece of raw unfiltered evidence."

The letter originally had been signed by over 370 actors and filmmakers and now has new names attached, such as Rooney Mara, Jim Jarmusch, Michael Moore. The letter was published in the French newspaper Libération and US magazine Variety. it exhorted cinema to “draw lessons from history” and “be present to protect oppressed voices”.

The initial list of signatories included former Cannes winners Mike Leigh, Ruben Ostlund, Costa-Gavras, acclaimed Spanish director Pedro Almodovar, a raft of international stars and filmmakers entailing Yorgos Lanthimos, David Cronenberg. American heavyweights like Mark Ruffalo and Susan Sarandon have signed as well. The letter asserts, “we cannot remain silent while genocide is taking place in Gaza”.

At the Cannes opening ceremony, Binoche paid an impassioned tribute to Hassona, insisting “she should have been with us tonight”. She added, “in every region of the world, artists are fighting every day and making resistance into art”.

See the full letter below:

Fatma Hassona was 25 years old.

She was a Palestinian freelance photojournalist. She was targeted by the Israeli army on 16 April 2025, the day after it was announced that Sepideh Farsi’s film “Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk,” in which she was the star, had been selected in the ACID section of the Cannes Film Festival.

She was about to get married.

Ten of her relatives, including her pregnant sister, were killed by the same Israeli strike.

Since the terrible massacres of 7 October 2023, no foreign journalist has been authorised to enter the Gaza Strip. The Israeli army is targeting civilians. More than 200 journalists have been deliberately killed. Writers, film-makers and artists are being brutally murdered.

At the end of March, Palestinian filmmaker Hamdan Ballal, who won an Oscar for his film “No Other Land,” was brutally attacked by Israeli settlers and then kidnapped by the army, before being released under international pressure. The Oscar Academy’s lack of support for Hamdan Ballal sparked outrage among its own members and it had to publicly apologize for its inaction.

We are ashamed of such passivity.

Why is it that cinema, a breeding ground for socially committed works, seems to be so indifferent to the horror of reality and the oppression suffered by our sisters and brothers?

As artists and cultural players, we cannot remain silent while genocide is taking place in Gaza and this unspeakable news is hitting our communities hard.

What is the point of our professions if not to draw lessons from history, to make films that are committed, if we are not present to protect oppressed voices?

Why this silence?

The far right, fascism, colonialism, anti-trans and anti-LGBTQIA+, sexist, racist, Islamophobic and antisemitic movements are waging their battle on the battlefield of ideas, attacking publishing, cinema and universities, and that’s why we have a duty to fight.

Let’s refuse to let our art be an accomplice to the worst.

Let us rise up.

Let us name reality.

Let us collectively dare to look at it with the precision of our sensitive hearts, so that it can no longer be silenced and covered up.

Let us reject the propaganda that constantly colonizes our imaginations and makes us lose our sense of humanity.

For Fatma, for all those who die in indifference.

Cinema has a duty to carry their messages, to reflect our societies.

Let’s act before it’s too late.