DENMAN FUNDRAISER FOR GAZA
Join the Denman Palestine Solidarity Group on Thursday, November 13th for a fundraiser for Gaza, featuring a speaker, Sara Kishawi, and the Oscar-winning film, No Other Land.
DETAILS
- Denman Community Front Hall
- November 13, 2025 – dinner at 5:45 pm followed by Sara’s talk at 6:30 pm and film at 7 pm
- Entry by donation
- Funds raised from this event will be donated to important causes in Gaza
Featured Speaker: Sara Kishawi
Following a simple supper at 5:45 pm, Sara Kishawi will share her reflections on the current context in Gaza. Originally from Gaza City, Sara is a key organizer in the Palestine solidarity movement in Nanaimo. She is also one of two Palestinian Muslim students that Vancouver Island University (VIU) chose to discipline and suspend in 2024, following their involvement in the longest running university solidarity encampment in Canada. Sara’s activism on campus included putting up unauthorized posters and organizing sit-ins, and led to her being suspended retroactively, despite having already graduated.
The suspension was upheld by VIU on an internal appeal, a result that is currently under judicial review on the basis that it was unreasonably punitive and violated Kishawi’s Charter rights. The outcome of this case could set a legal precedent for students sanctioned or punished for political speech and activities by B.C. universities. It is also concerning given the systematic suppression of support for Palestine referenced by the B.C. Civil Liberties Association in a recent statement by the same name (issued in March, updated June 30, 2025). 1
It’s also important in light of disquieting initiatives in Canada, such as Bill C-9, the Combatting Hate Act.2 Critics are concerned about aspects of this bill that could see a strengthening of police overreach and over enforcement in respect of protests in support of Palestinian rights, beyond what we’ve already seen. Among the concerns is the vague and broad wording that empowers police to take discretionary action based on their interpretation of protesters’ intent as opposed to protesters’ actual actions. As the National Coordinator of the International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group recently commented, protecting people in Canada against hate-based incidents is laudable, but not through legislation that “will create a chill against protest and dissent, and risk the criminalization of free expression and free assembly in Canada”.3
Film: No Other Land
Winner of the 2025 Oscar for Best Documentary, No Other Land offers an essential and unflinching look at life under Israeli military occupation.4
No Other Land co-director Basel Adra has been documenting the expulsion and decimation of his community in the small mountain village of Masafer Yatta in the southern West Bank since childhood. Adra’s early memories as a child are plagued with images of Israeli soldiers raiding his home, witnessing his father Nasser, a Palestinian activist, being arrested, and the ongoing Israeli military occupation and settler aggression. By picking up his camera, Adra has tirelessly documented this reality of impending forced removals, bulldozers destroying homes, and the violence that inevitably follows. The film takes place prior to October 7, 2023, when attention to the region was in shorter supply.
During Adra’s fight to preserve his mountain village community, he forms an unexpected friendship and alliance with Israeli journalist Yuval Abraham, who joins his resistance efforts. It is clear this bond is not one grounded in equity, with Adra living under occupation and Abraham’s freedom of movement. Yet the relationship that develops between the two — showing deep care, humanity, and above all how solidarity can break down barriers, even during occupation — is at the heart of this piece.
Film co-director – Hamdan Ballal – was in the headlines following the Oscar win in March 2025 following his forcible disappearance from his home in the occupied West Bank village of Susiya by Israeli soldiers, after he was assaulted by Israeli settlers attacking Palestinians. Ballal was subsequently released but no one has been held accountable. The film production team reports that there has been a massive upswing in attacks by settlers and Israeli forces in the area since the Oscar win.5
1 https://bccla.org/2025/03/bccla-statement-against-the-systemic-suppression-of-support-for-palestine/
2 First Reading, September 19, 2025: https://www.parl.ca/DocumentViewer/en/45-1/bill/C-9/first-reading
3 National Coordinator of the ICLMG, Tim McSorley
4 Synopsis at https://www.tiff.net/events/no-other-land
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