On a tense Saturday afternoon, September 13, 2025, the tranquil olive groves of At-Tuwani, a small Palestinian village in the southern West Bank, became the backdrop for a dramatic and troubling sequence of events involving Basel Adra, the celebrated Oscar-winning filmmaker, and his family. According to CNN and the Associated Press, Adra alleges that after a violent attack by Israeli settlers on his property, Israeli soldiers raided his home, searched his wife’s phone, and detained a family member—all while his infant daughter was present.
Adra, who made history in 2025 as the first Palestinian filmmaker to win an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature Film with No Other Land, has long chronicled the realities of life under occupation. But this weekend’s events, he says, have left his family shaken and his home inaccessible. "Even if you are just filming the settlers, the army comes and chases you, searches your house," Adra told the Associated Press. "The whole system is built to attack us, to terrify us, to make us very scared."
The trouble began when a group of Israeli settlers from the illegal Havat Ma’on outpost, notorious in the region, trespassed into Adra’s olive grove. As Adra and several others attempted to confront the settlers, violence erupted. "The police, the army came when the settlers were attacking us," Adra recounted to CNN. "They did not stop them. One of the settlers chased one of the solidarity activists, and he beat her on the ground. The soldiers were watching, didn’t do anything." The consequences were immediate and severe: one of Adra’s brothers was run over by a settler riding an ATV and rushed to the hospital, while another brother and a cousin also sustained injuries.
While Adra was at the hospital with his wounded relatives, he received word from his family that his home in At-Tuwani was being raided. Nine Israeli soldiers stormed the house, questioned his wife Suha about his whereabouts, and went through her phone, all while their 9-month-old daughter was in the home. The soldiers also briefly detained one of Adra’s uncles, according to the Associated Press. By Saturday night, Adra said he was unable to return to his village, as soldiers were blocking the entrance and he feared being detained himself.
For Adra and his family, this was not an isolated incident. He stated, "We’ve filed dozens of complaints against these same settlers for grazing their sheep among our olive trees. We bring the police, and they do nothing." The sense of impunity surrounding settler violence, and the apparent lack of intervention from Israeli authorities, has become a familiar and deeply frustrating pattern for Palestinians in the region.
Israeli military officials offered a different account of the day’s events. They said soldiers entered At-Tuwani after Palestinians threw rocks, injuring two Israeli civilians. The military stated that their forces were still in the village, searching the area and questioning people. This response, however, did little to reassure Adra or his supporters, who view the pattern of settler attacks followed by military raids on Palestinian homes as a recurring cycle of intimidation.
Adra’s work as a journalist and filmmaker has focused precisely on documenting such cycles of violence and displacement. Born and raised in Masafer Yatta, the southern West Bank area where At-Tuwani is located, Adra has spent years chronicling the struggles of his community. His 2025 Oscar-winning documentary, No Other Land, co-directed with Israeli journalist Yuval Abraham and activists Hamdan Ballal and Rachel Szor, tells the story of Masafer Yatta’s residents as they resist Israeli military efforts to demolish their villages and expand settlements. The film, which premiered at the 74th Berlin International Film Festival in 2024 and won multiple awards—including the Panorama Audience Award for Best Documentary Film and the Berlinale Documentary Film Award—has drawn international attention to the plight of Palestinians living under occupation.
But with that attention has come increased scrutiny and, Adra believes, heightened danger. After his co-director Hamdan Ballal was attacked by settlers in March 2025, Adra told the Associated Press he felt he was being targeted more intensely since winning the Oscar. The events of September 13 only deepened that sense of vulnerability. "What happened today in his village, we’ve seen this dynamic again and again, where the Israeli settlers brutally attack a Palestinian village and later on the army comes, and attacks the Palestinians," said co-director Yuval Abraham, expressing his fear for Adra’s safety.
The broader context of these incidents is a landscape shaped by decades of conflict and shifting power dynamics. Israel captured the West Bank, along with the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, in the 1967 Mideast war. Today, more than 500,000 Israeli settlers live in over 100 settlements across the West Bank, while roughly three million Palestinians live under Israeli military rule. The area’s Western-backed Palestinian Authority administers population centers, but Israeli military operations remain pervasive and disruptive.
Masafer Yatta, where Adra’s family lives, was designated by the Israeli military as a live-fire training zone in the 1980s—a move that led to orders for the expulsion of residents, most of whom are Arab Bedouin. Despite repeated demolitions of homes, tents, water tanks, and olive orchards, about 1,000 residents have remained, clinging to their land and way of life amid constant threats of removal. The fear of outright expulsion is ever-present.
The violence of September 13 occurred against the backdrop of the ongoing war in Gaza, which has seen hundreds of Palestinians killed in the West Bank during wide-scale Israeli military operations. There has also been a surge in settler attacks on Palestinians, as well as an increase in Palestinian attacks on Israelis. The cycle of violence and retaliation has left communities like At-Tuwani caught in the crossfire, with little recourse for justice or security.
Adra’s story, and the international recognition his work has received, highlights both the resilience of Palestinian communities and the persistent dangers they face. His documentary No Other Land stands as a testament to the power of storytelling in the face of adversity, but the events of September 13 are a stark reminder that the struggle for safety and dignity continues, even for those whose voices have reached the world stage.
As night fell on At-Tuwani, Adra’s uncertainty about his family’s safety and his inability to return home underscored a reality that is all too common for many Palestinians in the West Bank. The olive trees may stand as silent witnesses, but the stories they shelter are far from over.