‘Page Six Hollywood’ recently declared: “War of Open Letters Erupts Between Pro-Israel and Pro-Palestine Factions in Hollywood.” Only a few years ago, a headline like this would have seemed unthinkable.

The article described an increasingly open struggle between pro-Palestine and pro-Israel forces within the entertainment industry.  On one side are artists and other industry figures taking a clear stand against Israel’s genocide in Gaza; on the other are defenders of Israel attempting to deny that genocide in the face of irrefutable evidence.

Yet even this framing failed to tell the whole story. What is unfolding is far more consequential than a quarrel among celebrities or a “war of open letters.” It is part of a brewing cultural revolution in American society – one that has now reached the highest echelons of the country’s cultural establishment. And in that struggle, Israel is losing – and losing badly.

Though the article acknowledged that support for Palestine has become powerful enough to divide Hollywood openly, it concealed the scale of the transformation underway by presenting the moment as a ‘war’ between two factions.

Long before Israeli filmmakers, production companies, and actors established a significant presence in Hollywood, the industry’s cultural infrastructure routinely elevated Israel at every opportunity. Film and television constructed a glossy image of a heroic nation whose establishment and continued survival were portrayed as miraculous, while the dispossession and violence underpinning that narrative were largely erased from view.

Palestinians, Arabs and Muslims, meanwhile, were almost invariably cast in a negative light: the uncultured and menacing ‘other,’ supposedly possessing no legitimate claim to civilization, no recognizable morality, and no history or identity worthy of serious consideration.

Indeed, Hollywood played a central role in the systematic dehumanization of Palestinians in Western........

© Middle East Monitor