The Haifa International Film Festival has announced the films participating in the Israeli Film Competition. Now in its 41st edition, the festival will take place from October 5 – 14, 2025.
Israeli Film Competition
Annu
Israel/2025/86 min/Arabic and Hebrew with English and Hebrew subtitles
Directed by Maya Hattab Hazaz
Sana and Annu, a grandmother and her six-year-old granddaughter, live together in a Druze village in the Galilee. The day before Annu is to move with her family to Haifa, she loses consciousness. When she awakens, she whispers to her grandmother, “you will find my children from Syria.” Sana questions her further and concludes that Sana is the reincarnation of her sister Muna, who was killed in the war. She is moved by the discovery, but Annu’s parents explain that the fainting spell was due to epilepsy and they separate Anny from Sana. Sana is upset and embarks on an attempt to enter Syria, the country she left at age 17, there she discovers what her granddaughter really meant, and what she herself was looking for.
The Agency: What’s the deal with UNRWA?
Israel/Germany/2025/86 min/Hebrew and English with English and Hebrew subtitles
Directed by Duki Dror
After the massacre of October 7th, UNRWA was in the headlines worldwide after claims were made of their employees’ involvement in the attack. In Israel, steps were taken to end cooperation with the organization and limit its authority, while in Gaza, the humanitarian situation grew worse. The film explores UNRWA’s role throughout the years, as a rehabilitation agency for refugees of the 1948 war that was intended to be temporary, but continued its work for 75 years and in effect became a central factor in maintaining refugee status and forging Palestinian nationalism.
Naomi’s Questions
Israel/2025/72 min/Hebrew and English with English and Hebrew subtitles
Directed by Gerard Alon
An intimate and poetic documentary on Naomi, a 34-year-old woman with Williams Syndrome. The film was shot by her father over more than 30 years, primarily in the family home in the Old City of Jaffa, and follows Naomi’s path towards independence, ever since leaving home at age 21. With the use of archival footage, contemporary scenes and poetic reenactments, the film becomes a cinematic letter, a dialogue between a father and daughter. From personal and shared memories, the film examines the way we perceive difference, vulnerability, and intelligence.
Book of Ruth
Israel/2025/88 min/Hebrew and French with English and Hebrew subtitles
Directed by Esty Bitton Shushan
Ruth and Shmuel, an Ultra-Orthodox couple, thought they knew all there is to know about love. She, a young and sensitive mother, always tests boundaries, but elegantly. He, a brilliant Torah scholar with a promising future. But when tragedy strikes, everything they knew about family, community, parenting, and even God – is put to the test. The film is an emotional human drama, with surreal moments. The story of two people who are trying not to lose one another, but speak different languages that expand the emotional and religious gap between them, in a world where it is forbidden to ask questions, especially not difficult ones.
Some Notes on the Current Situation
Israel/2025/79 min/Hebrew with English and Hebrew subtitles
Directed by Eran Kolirin
Six short tales that together form a tragi-comic reflection on the existential and spiritual condition of humans in these dark times, in this corner of the Middle East, and perhaps also beyond it, in the rest of the world.
Proud Jewish Boy
Israel/Poland/2025/87 min/Hebrew with English and Hebrew subtitles.
Directed by Isri Halpern
They say that the personal is political and it is hard to find a better example than the story of Hershel Greenshpan, a 17-year-old Jewish youth, who found himself in the midst of an epic historical event – Kristallnacht – the event that “opened” the Holocaust. The Germans, by the way, claim that Hershel started World War II. The documentary presents the full story of this mysterious murderer for the first time, telling one of the most fascinating and overlooked stories that compose the larger story of the Holocaust of the Jews in Europe.
Of Dogs and Men
Israel/2024/82 min/Hebrew with English subtitles
Directed by Dani Rosenberg
Early in the morning, 16-year-old Dar travels back to her home in Kibbutz Nir Oz to look for her dog, who was lost on that black Saturday. The film Of Dogs and Men was shot during the months of October and November 2023 at Kibbutz Nir Oz and other kibbutzim in the area, as well as on the border with Gaza, with the participation of people who were living or staying there at the time.
Fadia
Israel/2025/95 min/Arabic and Hebrew with English and Hebrew subtitles
Directed by Shady Srour
The film follows two families in an Arab village in the Galilee. The conservative Al-Hawi family is burying their student daughter Fadia alive, and the liberal Srour family save her from the grave and hide her in their home. An attempt of murder for the sake of family honor exposes the norms that oppress a great number of women in the world as well as the voice of the liberal minority.
Double Panther
Israel/2025/100 min/Hebrew with English and Hebrew subtitles
Directed by Marco Carmel
The true story of Yaakov Elbaz, a criminal who was planted as a mole in the Black Panthers by Turgeman. Elbaz gives Turgeman information, but begins to identify with the protest and his new friends, and is caught in a game that could ruin his life. A crime drama on the protest that changed Israel, and a criminal who is trying to mend a family. The documentary drama is based on historical events.
No Cakes from the Homefront
Israel/2025/75 min/Hebrew and English with English and Hebrew subtitles
Directed by Smadar Zamir
Forgotten testimonies and rare archival materials tell, for the first time, the stories of women on the homefront during the Yom Kippur War, exposing a new perspective on the war.
Baghdad Files
Israel/2025/78 min/Hebrew with English and Hebrew subtitles
Directed by Avida Livni
Despite the fact that over 70 years have passed, the State refuses to open the files of the investigative committee on an issue that troubles many: who threw the grenade at the Masuda Shem-Tov Synagogue? The grenade, which was thrown in 1951, killed five people, wounding around twenty more, and was considered to be the great terror attack that led to the swift immigration of most Iraqi Jews in an operation called “Ezra and Nehemia.” For years, many of the immigrants believed that the State of Israel had a part in the event, in order to convince the wealthier classes of Iraqi Jews to immigrate. However, recently, a box of documents and testimonies was found in an American University that was intended for “future researchers” and deals with the question “who threw the grenade?” The documents were left by Baruch Nadel, an eminent Israeli journalist, who independently interviewed over 150 witnesses over many years and came to the conclusion: the person who threw the grenade was a member of the Jewish underground, acting in service of the government.
Israeli Short Film Competition
25 short films, of them, 13 are student films, will participate in this year’s short film competitions: the Student Short Film Competition; the Independent Short Film Competition; the Animated Short Film Competition. The winner of the Independent Short Film Competition will be screened for the members of the American Academy and will compete for a place on the list of nominees for an Oscar in the short film category.
Special Screenings
Holding Her Ground
Israel/2024/60 min/Arabic and Hebrew with English and Hebrew subtitles
Directed by Bracha Zisman Cohen
“There are two hearts beating in my chest, if one of them stops beating the other will become silent and die along with it. Part of me is Palestinian and the other part is Israeli.” Raida Adon – actor, video art artist, painter. As the daughter of a Muslim mother and Jewish father, she carries a genetic, emotional, and historic weight – even if she tries to evade it, it will emerge in her art. Raida is the only Arab ever to have a solo exhibit in the Israel Museum. Despite her success, Raida cannot find her place as a Palestinian artist in Israel. Her search for belonging and a home take her to Paris, where she discovers that in the European art world she is seen as Israeli, and that people have difficulty accepting her complex identity. Wherever she lives there is a packed suitcase ready for any event. She feels that she belongs neither here nor there. Only art feels like home.
First Exposure – New Israeli Film
A curated selection of five Israeli short films from the past year will be shown in a festive premiere with the filmmakers in attendance.
The Haifa International Film Festival takes place with the support of the Ministry of Culture and Sports – Israeli Film Council, the Ministry of Tourism, the Ministry of Regional Cooperation, and the Haifa Municipality. The festival’s Artistic Director is Yaron Shamir, and it is produced by Ethos – The Haifa Municipality Art, Culture and Sports Association Company. The full program and ticket information will be available on the Haifa Film Festival website: https://www.haifaff.co.il/eng.
