Movie theatre cancels Jewish film festival
Cites security concerns amid war in Gaza
A movie theatre in Hamilton is refusing to host an upcoming Jewish film festival, citing “security and safety concerns at this particularly sensitive moment.”
The Playhouse Cinema was slated to host the Hamilton Jewish Film Festival (HJFF) from April 7 to 9, which included six films produced in France, Poland and Israel aimed at representing “the contemporary Jewish experience,” according to a news release issued by the Hamilton Jewish Federation, which organizes the annual festival. The movies touched upon diverse topics from Holocaust denial to an Arab-owned hair salon in Haifa, and included a commemorative screening of a film by director Yahav Winner, who was murdered by Hamas on Oct. 7 while protecting his wife and newborn daughter at a kibbutz in Israel.
Growing backlash led the theatre to reach “a difficult decision,” the company said in its statement released Tuesday night.
“After receiving numerous security and safety related emails, phone calls, and social media messages, the Playhouse Cinema reached a difficult decision to postpone the Hamilton Jewish Federations’ venue rental,” it said.
“The Playhouse Cinema’s mission is to be a welcome home to a variety of cultural groups, serving the Hamilton area through our film programming.”
The decision was quickly condemned by the Hamilton Jewish Federation.
“In withdrawing its support of a Jewish film festival based on outrageous claims by a few individuals that any film produced in Israel is a form of ‘Zionist propaganda,’ the Playhouse Cinema is prioritizing the will of antisemites over an apolitical cultural festival that stands for artistic excellence and integrity,” the community group said in a statement.
“The Hamilton Jewish Federation rejects this attempt to sever Jewish from Israeli identity at a time when 50 per cent of the world’s Jewish population resides in Israel and to categorize Jews into ‘acceptable’ and ‘unacceptable.’ ”
The community group said on its website that it would announce a new time and location for the festival.
Playhouse Cinema did not respond to National Post’s request for comment before publication.
The films scheduled to be screened at the HJFF also included Hope Without Boundaries, which follows an Israeli field hospital helping Ukrainian patients following the Russian invasion, and Children of Nobody, which explores troubled youth on the margins of Israeli society.
The theatre’s decision was denounced by local Conservative MP Dan Muys, who called it “quite simply antisemitic.”
“All the more reason for the Film Festival to go on, bigger and better when rescheduled,” the Flamborough-glanbrook representative wrote.
Melissa Lantsman, deputy leader of the federal Conservative Party, said this is “the new normal politicians are appeasing.” She urged Canadians to “wake up.”
Union leader Joseph Mancinelli, the Canadian director of the Labourers’ International Union of North American (LIUNA), blasted Playhouse Cinema’s “appalling decision.”
“This shameful attempt to silence the voice, representation and lived experiences of the Jewish community is divisive, it is dangerous and it is blatant antisemitism. Enough,” he wrote on X late Tuesday, shortly after the announcement.
The Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA) said that Playhouse Cinema’s decision bowed “to mob rule” and failed to stand up in the face of antisemitism.
“What a small Hamilton theatre has experienced is a fraction of what our community has experienced over the past five months. When the theatre received some threatening phone calls and letters over renting their venue to the Hamilton Jewish Federation for a Jewish cultural film festival, instead of standing up to the hate, they caved to it,” Judy Zelikovitz a vice president at CIJA overseeing university and partner services, told National Post in a statement.
“We’re angered and disgusted by the whole situation. It’s a sad day for Canadian values, the arts and for the people of Hamilton.”
IT’S A SAD DAY FOR CANADIAN VALUES, THE ARTS AND FOR THE PEOPLE OF HAMILTON.