Palestinian actor Motaz Malhees unable to attend Oscars due to travel ban

Actor Motaz Malhees, one of the stars of the Oscar-nominated film “The Voice of Hind Rajab”, will not be able to attend this year’s Academy Awards due to a US travel restriction affecting Palestinian passport holders.

Malhees, who portrays a call centre operator trying to help a five-year-old Palestinian girl trapped in a car under fire in Gaza, said he cannot enter the United States because of his Palestinian citizenship.

In an Instagram post, he wrote, “Three days left to the Oscars. Our film ‘The Voice of Hind Rajab’ is nominated for an Academy Award. I had the honour of playing one of the lead roles in a story the world needed to hear. But I will not be there.”

He added, “You can block a passport. You cannot block a voice.”

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The restriction was introduced during the administration of US President Donald Trump, which bars people with Palestinian passports from entering the United States.
However, the film’s director Kaouther Ben Hania, who is from Tunisia, is expected to attend the ceremony.

The film tells the story of Palestinian child Hind Rajab and is nominated for Best International Feature at the Oscars. Rajab’s mother, Wissam Hamada, also cannot travel to the US and will watch the ceremony from Greece with her family after being granted asylum there.