Palestinian journalist and film-maker Juman Quneis will be speaking at the Leeds Palestinian Film Festival tonight. And ahead of the event, she told us why she’s come all the way from the occupied West Bank to speak about her film The Loud Silence.

Juman Quneis: “they chose a different way”

Juman Quneis was studying in Leeds in 2023 when Israel’s genocide in Gaza escalated, and she chose to make a film about the local Women in Black group – “a loose international network of women calling for peace”. The 29-minute documentary, the festival explains, looks at:

both the power of silent protest, and the many factors influencing the women involved. They talk very movingly of their varied religious beliefs, the impact of other struggles for justice, and deep personal grief and loss.

As Quneis told the Canary, the film looks at how Leeds Women in Black gather:

in the city centre in Leeds every Tuesday, wearing black and standing in silence, holding black cards and signs, reading ‘stop genocide against Gaza’, ‘stop killing children’, ‘stop killing women’.

Quneis explained the women’s motivation, saying:

They chose to express their hope and their willing to stop genocide, to stop killing children and women. They chose a different way to say that, to express the grief, the sadness, the sorrow towards victims of war.

She added:

They felt like it’s human to take a stance towards what’s going on. And they are trying to do something. They describe it as a small thing, as a few things, towards what’s going on in Palestine. But I feel like it’s a big thing, and it’s an important thing. So I would like that people who watch this film, they believe, as women in black believe, they could do any small thing, but it matters. It has an impact.

When the women hand leaflets out to the public, Juman Quneis pointed out:

it educates people about Palestine with very trusted information, taken from international organisations that verify that these figures are right and true.

‘Under occupation, nothing is normal’

Jumam Quneis also highlighted the ongoing horrific situation people are living through in occupied Gaza:

The situation in Gaza is, I can’t describe it, because people don’t live normally. They don’t have houses, they don’t have streets, they don’t have infrastructure, they don’t have schools, they don’t have hospitals… They live with the minimum of basic needs in their life. Still, now, lots of people are looking for… clean water to drink, and spaces to live in.

And she added that, while Israel’s occupation of the West Bank is different, it’s also a massive challenge:

In the West Bank, which is the second part of Palestine, where I live, where I came from, in Ramallah, for example, we have a different challenge. We have the challenge of settlers who are occupying our land, who are depriving us from movement between our cities, from collecting olives, from reaching out to our universities and schools, and also who take over the resources of water and who take the land also.

So it’s a different challenge, but still, we are, as I told you, under occupation. Nothing is good, nothing is nice, nothing is normal.

Despite the ongoing suffering of Palestinians under Israeli occupation, however, Juman Quneis’s film is a reminder that any action people around the world can take in solidarity with the Palestinian people matters.

By Ed Sykes

This post was originally published on Canary.