Ken Loach Vows ‘Every Penny’ His New Film Makes In Israel Will Go To Palestinians

Image by Getty Images
(JTA) — British film director Ken Loach, a fierce advocate of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, said “every penny” earned from the screening in Israel of his latest film will go to Palestinian organizations.
In a letter to the editor of the London-based daily newspaper The Guardian, Loach, as well as producer Rebecca O’Brien and screenwriter Paul Laverty of the Sixteen Films production company, wrote that: “We fully support the aims of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement as an expression of the grassroots call in Palestine for solidarity against the Israeli state’s breach of international law.”
The letter writers cited the call by BDS movement co-founder Omar Barghouti for a cultural boycott of Israel. “We have always respected this appeal and have encouraged other people working in the arts to do the same. We reject the allegation that any of us have exempted ourselves from the cultural boycott,” they wrote.
The letter published on Tuesday comes after an article published last week in The Guardian reported that his films have been widely shown in Israel, including his most recent, “I Daniel Blake.”
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a gift today!
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Most Popular
- 1
News Student protesters being deported are not ‘martyrs and heroes,’ says former antisemitism envoy
- 2
News Who is Alan Garber, the Jewish Harvard president who stood up to Trump over antisemitism?
- 3
Opinion The dangerous Nazi legend behind Trump’s ruthless grab for power
- 4
Opinion What Jewish university presidents say: Trump is exploiting campus antisemitism, not fighting it
In Case You Missed It
-
Culture This Jewish New Yorker survived the Holocaust and the Hungarian Revolution, and is still helping others today
-
Fast Forward Trump says he and Netanyahu are ‘on the same side of every issue’ following talks on Iran, tariffs
-
Fast Forward California school board members accused of antisemitism during contentious meeting
-
Fast Forward Over 100 Chicago-area rabbis and cantors condemn Trump’s campus crackdown
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.