Dialogue: select filmmakers in attendance.

Sunday, April 19, 4:00 p.m. | From the front lines of Chicago to the echoes of ancestral lands, these six shorts explore the resilience of the Palestinian spirit amidst displacement and loss. Join us for a journey through memory, resistance, and the unyielding hope for liberation that bridges generations.

Program:

ON THE SIDEWALK
2025, dir. Tom Callahan, 10 min, USA, In English
This short takes the pulse of onlookers, haters, and supporters on the outskirts of Chicago’s marches against the genocide of Gaza. What do they tell us about the challenges and possibilities we'll encounter on the road to liberation of Palestine - and the world? Director Tom Callahan will be present. 

LIVE BROADCAST
2025, dir. Emad Badwan, 10 min, Palestine, In Arabic with English subtitles
A journalist leaves his filming location just minutes before a live broadcast to go to the restroom. While waiting in queue, he hears both praise and complaints. His tension and need to use the restroom continue until he reluctantly returns to the live broadcast to cover an ongoing massacre.

PALESTINE ISLANDS
2023, dirs. Nour Ben Salem and Julien Menanteau, 22 min, France, In Arabic with English subtitles
Maha, 12, is part of the last generation of Palestinian refugees from the Balata camp. Following a faintness from her blind grandfather, she imagines a crazy project: to make him believe that the wall of separation has fallen and that a return to his native land is possible. With the help of her friends from the camp, the young girl imagines a funny trip for him.

I KNOW YOU CAN HEAR ME
2025, dir. Yousef Salhi, 26 min, Palestine, Italy, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, In Arabic with English subtitles
After Saleem is released from prison after twenty years, he stays alone at home, haunted by nightmares, while Cosette tries to reconnect with him and understand why he’s isolating himself, hoping to help him face his past and rebuild their relationship. Will she succeed?

WHAT THE SAND REMEMBERS
2025, dir. Mahmoud Abughalwa, 27 min, Palestine, In Arabic with English subtitles
During the war on Gaza, a lone survivor grapples with the unbearable weight of grief. His entire family was killed in an airstrike — some buried, others still lost beneath a sand dune. Over the course of a year, he navigates the material and psychological remains of survival, memory, and the haunting absence of closure.

VISITING THE DEAD
2023, dir. Elias Issa Halabi, 35 min, Palestine, In Arabic with English subtitles
The film captures the intimate and emotional return of families to their confiscated lands, offering a window into the lived experience of dispossession. Through personal testimonies and observational sequences, it explores how these yearly visits become acts of resistance, remembrance, and connection to a disappearing landscape.

Chicago Palestine Film Festival | April 11–25, 2026

Founded in 2001, the Chicago Palestine Film Festival (CPFF), a program of the Middle East Charitable and Cultural Society Inc., a non-profit organization, is an annual cultural event that serves as a vibrant platform for showcasing the rich and diverse narratives of Palestinian cinema. Film synopses provided by CPFF. Learn more at palestinefilmfest.com.

The Film Center is ADA accessible. This presentation will be projected without open captions. The theater is hearing-loop equipped. For accessibility requests, please email filmcenter@saic.edu