The screening will be followed by a panel discussion with Dan Davies, Dr Nadia Naser-Najjab, Anne Farooque and Jonathan Cook.

Based on the book by award-winning journalist Antony Loewenstein, The Palestine Laboratory reveals how Israel has turned Palestine into a testing ground for weapons and surveillance technologies. In two parts, the film first exposes how these tools are trialled on Palestinians, then follows their export across the world—from authoritarian regimes to Western democracies—entrenching systems of repression far beyond Palestine.

Speakers

Jonathan Cook is an award-winning British journalist. He was based in Nazareth, Israel, for 20 years. He returned to the UK in 2021. He is the author of three books on the Israel-Palestine conflict, and in 2011 was awarded the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. He has been a senior consultant and lead writer on two major reports by the International Crisis Group, a leading think-tank based in Washington and Brussels dealing with conflict resolution. Today he provides regular commentary and analysis on the Middle East, and blogs about the media, propaganda, corporate malfeasance, the environment and global politics.

Dan Davies is the executive producer of The Palestine Laboratory, and an executive producer and director whose work has been broadcast on the BBC, Channel 4, ITV1, Al Jazeera English & PBS. He has created and overseen numerous documentary series, and oversees the development and Executive Production for Black Leaf Films’ work, which creates powerful documentaries for major television broadcasters in the UK and internationally. He is also a playwright and his plays have been performed on Resonance FM, BBC Radio 4 and at the Arcola Theatre, Theatre 503, The Space and the National Theatre Studio. He has won two Peggy Ramsey awards and received Arts Council funding for “Domestic Extremists”, which was written on the Script Six Attachment at the Space Theatre.

Anne Farooque is the mother of one of the Filton 24. She teaches her native tongue, French, is involved in community work, has homeschooled her five children, and will be joining our panel discussion on behalf of her daughter, Zahra. Zahra is 25 years old and the eldest of 4 siblings for whom she cares a lot. She studied History for her undergraduate degree at UCL where she joined the encampment for Palestine in the summer of 2024 which lasted 100 days. She was due to start her law conversion course in January 2025 but was arrested in a dawn raid at her family home in November 2024. She has been held in prison for a year while waiting for her trial which will take place in June 2026.

Dr. Nadia Naser-Najjab is an internationally recognized Palestinian scholar, author, and educator whose work critically engages with the politics of knowledge production, resistance, and peacebuilding within the context of settler colonialism. She teaches and conducts research in Palestine Studies at the University of Exeter, is co-director of the European Center for Palestine Studies, and Program Director of MA in Palestine Studies. She holds a PhD in Middle East Studies from the University of Exeter and earned her undergraduate degree from Birzeit University in Palestine. She was previously an Assistant Professor at Birzeit University, and has held several other appointments and advisory positions in esteemed institutions including the Centre for Contemporary Arab Studies, Georgetown University, and the Council for British Research in the Levant.

Donations

All donations from this year’s festival will go to Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS), providing humanitarian assistance as well as health and social services to Palestinians whenever and wherever needed. You can donate when buying tickets.