The Oscar-winning Palestinian director of a documentary on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been released from detention, a day after being injured and arrested during a raid by Israeli settlers on his village in the occupied West Bank.
Hamdan Ballal, co-director of the award-winning No Other Land, alleged that he had been assaulted by settlers after filming them attacking a neighbour's house and then returning to make sure his own house was not attacked.
"I was just waiting outside, [to see] if any settlers or any army were attacking my home," he told Reuters after being released from police custody.
He said he had been pushed to the ground, while soldiers yelled at him to stand up and pointed their guns at him. "It's crazy, you can imagine your family, your kids inside the home and you need to protect them," he said.
The Israeli military said police and soldiers intervened after Palestinians threw rocks at the vehicles of Israeli citizens and later at Israeli security forces - claims that witnesses interviewed by The Associated Press (AP) disputed.
"In response, the forces apprehended three Palestinians suspected of hurling rocks at them, as well as an Israeli civilian involved in the violent confrontation," the Israeli military said in a statement.
It denied reports that at least one of the Palestinians was arrested in an ambulance.
Asked for an update on Ballal's condition and status on Tuesday, the Israeli police sent the statement first issued by the army the previous night.
No Other Land, a film about Israeli displacement of a Palestinian community, co-directed by Palestinian and Israeli directors, won the Oscar for Best Documentary at this year's Academy Awards and recently screened on Channel 4.
A Channel 4 spokesperson said: "We are deeply disturbed by reports that Hamdan Ballal, the co-director of Oscar-winning documentary No Other Land, which aired on Channel 4, has been injured while being attacked by settlers in the West Bank, and that he has been subsequently detained by Israeli authorities.
"Ballal is a remarkably brave filmmaker who has spent several years chronicling the treatment of Palestinians in the West Bank by settlers and the Israeli military. As a state which has said it is committed to freedom of expression, we urge Israeli authorities to ensure his safety."
Basel Adra, one of the film's other co-directors, said he believed the settlers had taken the army to the family house as revenge for the film's depiction of the Masafer Yatta area near where Monday's incident occurred.
"Because he carries his camera and documents what is going on, I think he is targeted and he was avenged this way at night," he said of his colleague Hamdan Ballal.
Ballal and Adra, both from Masafer Yatta, made the joint Palestinian-Israeli production with Israeli directors Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor.
The film has won a string of international awards, starting at the Berlin International Film Festival in 2024.
Israel captured the West Bank in the 1967 Middle East war, along with Gaza and east Jerusalem.
Israeli settlements in the territory are considered illegal under international law, though Israel disputes this.
They have expanded over the past 55 years, becoming a focal point for violence and conflicting claims over land.
European countries and the previous US administration of President Joe Biden have imposed sanctions on violent Israeli settlers, but under President Donald Trump, the White House has removed them.
Source: Reuters, Press Association
