
Show Notes
When six-year-old Hind Rajab reached out to the Red Cross for help in January 2024, the ambulance car was 8 minutes away from her. She could have been saved, but instead, the Israeli army murdered her and two of the rescuers in cold blood. Her voice went on to haunt millions around the world, standing as a chilling testament to the brutality and impunity with which Israel continues to commit genocide. In an attempt to document and remember Hind, Tunisian filmmaker Kaouther Ben Hania felt compelled to create The Voice of Hind Rajab; an Oscar short-listed film that documents the devastating story. In our conversation, Ben Hania reflects on the ethical and artistic choices behind the film, the responsibilities filmmakers carry when the violence they address has not ended, and the role of cinema as an act of listening. This episode is hosted and produced by Tala Elissa. Our executive producer is Zina Jardaneh. Our associate producer is Zeena Shehadeh. Social media by Leen Karadsheh. Research and copywriting by Dima Sharif. Branding by Sara Sukhun. Theme music includes excerpts from Clarissa Bitar, The Popular Art Centre - مركز الفن الشعبي & Rim Banna. This conversation was recorded on December 21, 2025. You can watch it on YouTube, here. Tarwida is a series of conversations that bring Palestinian arts, culture, and heritage to the forefront. We hear from artists, including writers, filmmakers, musicians, architects, culinary practitioners and more about their very own Palestine. In a nutshell, if you want to know more about (Creative) Palestine, this is the place to be. Follow us on socials @tarwidapodcast -- Relevant links and Resources: Follow Kaouther Ben Hania on Instagram (@kaoutharbenhania) Read Forensic Architecture’s investigation on the killing of Hind Rajab. Watch Al Jazeera’s documentary on the killing of Hind Rajab. Watch the trailers of Kaouther Ben Hania’s films: The Voice of Hind Rajab (2025) Four Daughters (Banat Ulfa) (2023) The Man who Sold his Skin (2020) Beauty and the Dogs (2017)
More from Tarwida
Palestinian architect Elias Khuri joins Tarwida Podcast to discuss architecture as an accumulation of people, places, histories, and knowledge. From his "Noon Insan" installation and his relationship with Elias Khoury and Kamal Boullata, to building around olive trees and restoring Khan Jaljulia, Khuri explores how architecture can preserve relationships with land and history without freezing them in place. He also reflects on the role of language in developing a contemporary Arab architectural vocabulary.
Architect and historian Nadi Abusaada joins Tarwida Podcast to discuss Palestinian cities through material culture. He explores how Palestinians reconstruct history through the traces that remain, the challenges of curating Palestinian heritage, and why romanticizing the past can obscure the realities of the present.
Artist Dima Srouji joins Tarwida Podcast to discuss glassmaking traditions in Jaba' and Hebron, the politics of archaeology in Palestine, her Amman Design Week installation, and reclaiming looted heritage through replication.
Sliman Mansour, the pioneering Palestinian artist whose paintings of olive trees, stone terraces, and steadfast women carried Palestine across generations, passed away this week at 79. In memory of his legacy, we're resharing this conversation, where he looks back on his childhood, his mischief and hardships, and speaks with humor and honesty about what art meant to him.
Palestinian abstract painter Samia Halaby, 89, on growing up in Jerusalem, the Nakba, documenting the Kafr Qasim massacre, and what censorship by Indiana University and Michigan State revealed about her art and the system.