Major Hollywood names such as Brad Pitt, Joaquin Phoenix, Rooney Mara and others have joined the Gaza-based drama The Voice of Hind Rajab as executive producers, as the film is set to premiere on the world stage at this year’s Venice Film Festival.
Award-winning filmmakers Alfonso Cuaron and Jonathan Glazer are also named as executive producers.
Glazer famously delivered an emotional speech during his Oscar win for Best International Film in March 2024, where he compared Zone of Interest, his film about the Holocaust, to what was happening in Gaza.
The Voice of Hind Rajab, directed by acclaimed filmmaker Kaouther Ben Hania, will debut in Venice on 3 September and will next be shown at the Toronto International Film Festival, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
The drama reconstructs the events surrounding the horrific killing of six-year-old Palestinian girl Hind Rajab last January, who was targeted by Israeli forces alongside her cousins, aunt and uncle while travelling by car.
Ben Hania’s film utilises voice recordings between Hind and medical volunteers with the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) who attempted to stay on the line in order to get an ambulance to reach her.
The PRCS recorded gunfire during a phone call with Hind, who was pleading for emergency services to save her.
Two paramedics were also killed while attempting to rescue the family.
In July 2024, UN experts stated that her killing could amount to a war crime, citing "compelling evidence" regarding the location of the family’s car in relation to an Israeli tank "and how it was shot at from very close range using a type of weapon that can only be attributed to the Israeli forces."
"Audio recordings of calls between Hind and emergency services suggest that she was the only survivor in the car before she was also killed," the experts said.
Hind’s tragic killing underscored the scale and nature of the atrocities Israel is committing in Gaza.
Since the outbreak of the war in October 2023, more than 62,000 Palestinians, most of them women and children have been killed by Israeli forces, according to local health officials.
The true number of casualties is believed to be much higher because thousands of uncounted victims are trapped under the rubble of destroyed buildings.
The besieged and devastated territory is also facing a famine - the first recorded in the Middle East in recent times.
The premiere of The Voice of Hind Rajab at the Venice Film Festival comes amid ongoing protests in the Italian city demanding a permanent end to the war on Gaza.
Media reports indicate that demonstrators held a "Free Palestine" banner outside the festival’s main venue, while a collective of Italian film professionals urged organisers to publicly denounce Israel’s invasion and siege of Gaza.
Additionally, hundreds of local political and human rights groups have planned a protest in Venice on Saturday to condemn Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza.