‘I felt they wanted to kill me’: Hamdan Ballal recounts settler-soldier assault
Hamdan Ballal (C) and Basel Adra (L) speak to the media following Ballal’s release from Israeli detention, Susiya, occupied West Bank, 25 March 2025
Oren Ziv writes in +972 on 26 March 2025:
It was already dark by the time Hamdan Ballal arrived back home on Tuesday evening, after 24 hours in Israeli military and police custody. The night before, around 15 Israeli settlers — armed with knives, batons, and one with a rifle — had stormed his village of Susiya in the occupied West Bank, hurling stones and assaulting residents along with activists who were staying there.
Ballal, the Oscar-winning co-director of “No Other Land” (which he wrote about last year for +972), was attacked on his doorstep by settlers and Israeli soldiers while trying to protect his family. After an ambulance arrived to provide medical treatment, he was then arrested by soldiers and detained overnight on the grounds that he had thrown stones at the settlers (eyewitnesses told +972 that, contrary to the claims of Israel’s army and police, the settlers’ raid was entirely unprovoked).
After his release, Ballal was taken to hospital in the city of Hebron before returning to Susiya; there, he reunited with family, friends, activists, and the three fellow co-directors of “No Other Land,” who had swiftly mobilized a global campaign for his release. He was barely able to walk unassisted, and his shirt was stained with blood. Sitting in the playground that overlooks the adjacent Israeli settlement of Ancient Susya, which has long threatened the existence of the Palestinian community, he told the assembled media what he had endured over the past 24 hours.
“At 6 p.m. last night, as we were starting the Iftar meal of Ramadan, settlers attacked my neighbor’s home,” he recounted. “I ran there to film what was happening, but the attack became more aggressive. I was afraid for my family who were alone in the house — my wife, my three kids, and my brother’s wife — so I ran home. I shut the door and stood outside to protect them, [ensuring] that no settlers would enter.”