Gaza film draws record 23‑minute ovation

At the 2025 Venice International Film Festival, 'The Voice of Hind Rajab' themed on a five-year-old girl killed by Israeli forces in Gaza earns a festival record.

Kaouther Ben Hania’s film received a 23‑minute standing ovation.

The cast held a photo of the six‑year‑old Gazan girl at the center of the story, prompting sobs and chants of “free Palestine.”

The film reconstructs the final, frantic phone call of Hind Rajab, who in January 2024 was trapped in the wreckage of a car in northern Gaza, surrounded by the bodies of her uncles and four young cousins.

In original recordings taken from the attack on January 29, 2024, Rajab is heard sobbing and telling the Red Crescent Society, “Please come to me, please come. I’m scared,” while bullets were fired in the background.

Ben Hania was quoted as saying, “When I first heard the voice of Hind Rajab, there was something beyond her words. It was the voice of Gaza itself calling for help – and no one could reach her.”

Critical reception has been intense with major film news outlets calling the film “vital” and describing its treatment of the event as having “heart‑wrenching urgency.”

Motaz Malhees, a Palestinian actor playing in the film said, “When I was 10 years old, I lived this life. Hearing Hind’s voice took me straight back to my childhood. I felt as if I had died a thousand times. This wasn’t acting. This was my life.”