Nearly 1,800 Hollywood actors, filmmakers pledge to boycott Israel’s movie industry

Around 1,800 people from the Hollywood movie industry, including some famous Hollywood actors, signed a letter published on Monday in which they vowed to boycott the Israeli movie industry, which they falsely alleged are involved in a genocide in Gaza.  

“We pledge not to screen films, appear at, or otherwise work with Israeli film institutions – including festivals, cinemas, broadcasters, and production companies – that are implicated in genocide and apartheid against the Palestinian people,” read the letter, which was organized and published by an organization that calls itself Film Workers for Palestine.

While there were some Hollywood stars among the signatories, the majority of the signatures appeared to be names that are not known among the general public. Among the famous ones were British star of the hit-show “The Crown,” Olivia Colman, who plays Queen Elizabeth II, and American actors Mark Ruffalo, Emma Stone, and Cynthia Nixon. The Spanish actor Javier Bardem, Mexican filmmaker Gael García Bernal, and British filmmaker Ken Loach were also among the signatories.

The letter listed specific Israeli cultural institutions singled out for boycott, including the Jerusalem Film Festival, Haifa International Film Festival, Docaviv and TLVfest, citing that some of these institutions “continue to partner with the Israeli government.” According to the letter, the boycott “takes aim at institutional complicity, not identity,” adding that “a few Israeli film entities are not complicit.”

In an FAQ document accompanying the letter, the signatories stressed that “complicity” also means lack of “endorsement” of “the rights of the Palestinian people."

The document went on to say that, “The vast majority of Israeli film production and distribution companies, sales agents, cinemas and other film institutions have never endorsed the full, internationally recognized rights of the Palestinian people."

This is the most recent in a long series of open letters signed by figures from the arts calling for condemnations and boycotts of Israel.

In May, an open letter signed by 72 former Eurovision participants called for the exclusion of Israel from the Eurovision Song Contest. 

Last month, some Italian filmmakers, known as Venice4Palestine, condemned Israel and urged a boycott with Italian actress Tecla Insolia saying that banning the Israeli actress Gal Gadot from the Venice Film Festival was “the minimum.” Gal Gadot did not attend.

Also last month, around 200 British and Irish writers called for an “immediate and complete” boycott of Israel, “until the people of Gaza are adequately provided with drinking water, food, and medical supplies, and until all other forms of relief and necessity are restored to the people of Gaza under the aegis of the United Nations.”

Boycotts against Israel and Israeli institutions have affected a lot more than the arts: Israeli universities have experienced a surge in academic boycotts – about 500 incidents of academic boycotts were reported during the half-year through February 2025, 66 percent more than in the six months following the beginning of the war on Oct. 7, 2023. 

Similarly, global corporations have increasingly postponed or canceled requests from Israeli hospitals for joint research, according to figures from top Israeli hospitals.

In addition, boycotts of Israeli products in general are growing in Germany, across Europe, and Japan.