New York based indie distributor Film Guild has acquired North American distribution rights to Palestinian filmmaker Kamal Aljafari's personal documentary “With Hassan in Gaza“, which recently screened at the New York Film Festival.
With Hassan in Gaza follows Aljafari and Hassan, a local guide, in 2001 as they travel along the Gaza coastline in search of Abdel Rahim, a man the director met in 1989 when they were serving time together as teenagers in the juvenile section of Israel's Naqab desert prison.
Aljafari's documentary, edited from three MiniDV tapes filmed in the Gaza Strip in 2001 and rediscovered years later, “transforms the footage into a profound cinematic meditation on memory, loss and the passage of time,” according to promotional materials.
Aljafari described this portrait of a Gaza Strip that no longer exists as “a tribute to the Gaza Strip and its people, to everything that was erased and that came back to me in this urgent moment of Palestinian existence or non-existence.”
Aljafari was born in the Israeli city of Ramla, which is a mixed Jewish-Arab city. He studied at the Academy of Media Arts in Cologne, Germany. The director, now based in Berlin, has taught at the New School in New York and the German Film Academy in Berlin. Aljafari's work, including his previous feature film Fidai's Film (2024), has been widely screened at major festivals and institutions around the world. His visual art installation “Chamber of the Dispossessed” was shown at the 35th Sao Paulo Biennale.
With Hassan in Gaza had its world premiere last summer at the Locarno Film Festival in Switzerland. The film, which was directed, shot and edited by Aljafari in collaboration with Hassan Elbubu, subsequently screened widely on the festival circuit, including the 2025 Toronto and New York Film Festivals. With Hassan in Gaza is produced by Kamal Aljafari Productions with executive producer Flavia Mazzarino.
The Screen Guild plans a US release in 2026.
The deal for Hassan in Gaza was negotiated by Film Guild chief Peter Kelly along with the film's executive producer Flavia Mazzarino and Aljafari.
“Director Kamal Aljafari has created a moving and touching work of art. We are honored to release the film in theaters and beyond,” Kelly said in a statement.
Mazzarino and Aljafari commented: “We are deeply moved that With Hassan in Gaza will be distributed in North America through one of the greatest champions of world and independent cinema in the United States. We look forward to sharing the life and humanity captured in this film.”
Other upcoming Cinema Guild releases in the US and North America include Hong Sang-soo's What This Nature Tells You and Alexander Koberidze's A Dry Leaf.
