Jewish figures are speaking out in support of Jonathan Glazer amid a backlash over the Zone of Interest director’s Oscar speech, with some calling his words “honest and brave”.
While accepting the award for best international film, Glazer said he refuted his “Jewishness and the Holocaust being hijacked by an occupation which has led to conflict for so many innocent people” in Gaza and Israel. His speech drew applause in the Dolby Theatre but was quickly condemned by groups such as Anti-Defamation League (ADL), and this week hundreds of Jewish Hollywood figures signed an open letter denouncing it.
But other filmmakers and organizations have said his words resonated with them, highlighting the complexity of views on the Israel-Gaza war and the rift it has created within the Jewish community.
The Auschwitz Memorial and progressive US Jewish groups such as Jewish Voice for Peace have defended the film-maker after outcry over his words at the 10 March ceremony.
“In his Oscar acceptance speech, Jonathan Glazer issued a universal moral warning against dehumanization. His aim was not to descend to the level of political discourse,” Piotr Cywiński, the director of the Auschwitz Memorial, said in a statement last week. “Critics who expected a clear political stance or a film solely about genocide did not grasp the depth of his message.”
The Zone of Interest chronicles the daily life of Rudolf Höss, an Auschwitz commandant, and his wife – and aims to show where dehumanization leads, Glazer said in his speech.
“All our choices were made to reflect and confront us in the present, not to say look what they did then, but rather look what we do now. Our film shows where dehumanization leads at its worst. It’s shaped all of our past and present,” he said.
In a statement on Tuesday, Jewish Voice for Peace said that “Glazer speaks for the massive and growing number of Jews who honor our histories by joining our Palestinian siblings in their struggle for freedom and justice.”
“Those attacking Glazer try to claim sole proprietorship of Jewish identity and the legacy of the Holocaust, in order to defend the Israeli government’s oppression, occupation and genocide of Palestinians,” the group said.
In the days after the speech, the ADL said his remarks “excuse terrorism” and the film’s executive producer said he disagreed with Glazer. The open letter signed by executives and professionals in Hollywood accused the director of “drawing a moral equivalence between a Nazi regime that sought to exterminate a race of people, and an Israeli nation that seeks to avert its own extermination”. The letter also defended Israeli actions in the region, saying: “The use of words like ‘occupation’ to describe an indigenous Jewish people defending a homeland that dates back thousands of years, and has been recognized as a state by the United Nations, distorts history.”
Others, however, praised him for putting the spotlight on atrocities in Gaza, including Simone Zimmerman, the cofounder of IfNotNow.
“The hysterics and lies about Jonathan Glazer’s honest, humane and brave Oscar speech simply reaffirms his point – that Zone of Interest was made to ‘confront us in the present – not to say, ‘Look what they did then,’ rather, ‘Look what we do now,’” Zimmerman said.
“Glazer is part of a significant, growing Jewish voice across the world that opposes the abuse of Jewish history to justify Israel’s campaign of dehumanization and genocide against the Palestinian people.”
Jesse Peretz, the director of the film Our Idiot Brother, also offered his support to Glazer in an interview with Variety, telling the outlet: “I think this is a case where nuanced language is unfortunately a dangerous thing to try to employ, because our intense emotions can make us want to bend the meaning behind words that make us uncomfortable – so that it becomes easier to reject them.”
In an article for the Nation, the writer Dave Zirin called Glazer’s speech “beautiful and brave” and in keeping with “the Jewish tradition of debate”.
He wrote that Glazer’s speech, alongside protests that blocked the streets around the venue, were among the few acknowledgements of the war’s brutality amid an otherwise glamorous evening. “It was a reminder that people are trying to stop the violence and win a permanent ceasefire in every corner, every college campus, every cultural arena in the country.”
Several stars, including Mark Ruffalo, Mahershala Ali and Billie Eilish, wore Artists4Ceasefire pins at the Oscars ceremony, and other Hollywood artists have expressed support for Glazer in the wake of the backlash.
Asif Kapadia, the British Muslim director of the 2015 Academy Award-winning documentary Amy, said in an interview with Variety: “[Glazer] stood up and told the truth. This is what true artists do.
“He used his power and position and the biggest global stage to speak up for people with no power, no voice, or those too afraid to speak up, in an industry which is very conservative and risk adverse and which has a long history of blacklisting people,” he said.
