Mahasen Nasser-Eldin
Jerusalem-born filmmaker Mahasen Nasser-Eldin tells stories of resistance and resilience, crafting carefully researched and scripted narratives that restore new life to forgotten figures and celebrate those on the margins of society. A meticulous researcher, Mahasenspecializes in reconstructing and scripting historical narratives using audio and visual archives. Her research interest focuses on the use of film in the writing of historical narratives. Her films have screened locally and internationally.
Mahasen holds an MA degree in filmmaking from Goldsmiths College in London and another MA in Arab Studies from Georgetown University in Washington, DC. She is currently heading to the film production department at Bethlehem’s Dar al-Kalima University College of Arts and Culture.
Najwa Najjar
Writer/ Director Najwa Najjar a member of the Academy for Arts and Sciences Writers (2020) MA Film(US) has worked in both documentary and fiction since 2000. Her critically acclaimed debut was the feature film Pomegranates and Myrrh (2009). Her second award-winning film Eyes of a Thief (2014) was the Palestinian nomination for the 2015 Oscars Best Foreign Film. Her third feature film Between Heaven and Earth Nov 2019 won the Cairo IFF Naguib Mahfouz Best Screenplay award.
Kamal Aljafari
Kamal Aljafari’s filmography includes ‘Recollection’ (2015), ‘Port of Memory’ (2009), and ‘The Roof’ (2006). He was a featured artist at the 2009 Robert Flaherty Film Seminar in New York, and in 2009/2010 was the Benjamin White Whitney Fellow at Harvard University’s Radcliffe Institute and Film Study Center. In 2010, he taught film at The New School in New York City, and from 2011 to 2013 he was a senior lecturer and head of the directing program for the German Film and Television Academy (DFFB), Berlin. He is the recipient of numerous film prizes and art grants. In 2013, Aljafari received the art medal of the state of Rio Grande do Sul in Brazil. A retrospect of his work was shown 2016 at Lussas Film Festival in France and at the Cinémathèque Québécoise.
Amber Fares
Director, producer, and cinematographer of the Sundance supported film, Speed Sisters (2015). Sundance Momentum Fellow (2019), Sundance Editing and Story Lab (2014), Sundance Fellow (2012). Speed Sisters won the best documentary at the Adelaide FF and Vail FF. Amber was the co-producer and cinematographer on The Judge, which won a Peabody Award in 2019. She was also the supervising producer on an episode of America Inside Out with Katie Couric, for which her episode won a Frontpage award. She also worked as field director and cinematographer on the PBS documentary series, And She Could Be Next.
Cherien Dabis
Cherien Dabis is a trailblazing Palestinian American narrative film and television writer-director. Her critically acclaimed feature films AMREEKA (2009) and MAY IN THE SUMMER (2013), in which she made her acting debut, both had their world premieres in competition at the Sundance Film Festival. AMREEKA went on to win the coveted FIPRESCI International Critics Prize at Cannes as well as a dozen more international awards. It was nominated for a Best Picture Gotham Award, 3 Independent Spirit Awards, including Best Picture, and was named one of the Top Ten Independent Films of the Year by the National Board of Review.
Jumana Manna
(b. 1987) is a visual artist working primarily with film and sculpture. Her work explores how power is articulated through relationships, often focusing on the body and materiality in relation to narratives of nationalism, and histories of place. She was awarded the A.M. Qattan Foundation’s Young Palestinian Artist Award in 2012 and the Ars Viva Prize for Visual Arts in 2017. Manna has participated in various film festivals and exhibitions, including Henie Onstad Museum, Norway, 2018; Mercer Union, Canada, 2017; Jeu de Paume and CAPC Bordeaux, France, 2017; SculptureCenter, USA, 2014; Marrakech Biennale 6, 2016; The Nordic Pavilion at the 57th Venice Biennale; as well as the 54th and 56th Viennale International Film Festivals, 66th and 68th Berlinale and CPH:DOX 2018, where Wild Relatives won the New:Visions award. Manna was raised in Jerusalem and is based in Berlin.