Hollywood Industry Group Urges Emmys to Pull Nomination From Palestinian Journalist Linked to Terror Group

05.08.2024 20:19

The Algemeiner

Bisan Atef Owda in a scene from “It’s Bisan From Gaza, I’m Still Alive After Six Months Of Bombing.” Photo: YouTube screenshot

The pro-Israel, nonprofit entertainment industry organization Creative Community for Peace (CCFP) has called on the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (NATAS) to revoke an Emmy nomination for a Palestinian journalist and filmmaker who has ties to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a widely designated terrorist organization.

Bisan Atef Owda was nominated at the 2024 Emmy Awards for News & Documentary with the Qatari-owned media outlet AJ+ in the category of outstanding hard news feature story: short form for their series “It’s Bisan From Gaza and I’m Still Alive.” Nominations were announced on July 25 and the winners will be presented in two ceremonies on Sep. 25 and 26 in New York.

Owda won a Peabody Award in June for “It’s Bisan From Gaza and I’m Still Alive,” in which she reports from the Gaza Strip and documents what Palestinian civilians are experiencing during the ongoing Israel-Hamas war. She dedicated her award to anti-Israel college students protesting on their campuses around the world and those who support a boycott of the Jewish state.

It was first exposed in late July that Owda regularly attended and spoke at PFLP rallies. CCFP told TheWrap that she also hosted events honoring Palestinians injured or killed fighting Israeli soldiers, and in 2018, the PFLP referred to Owda as a member of the Progressive Youth Union of the organization.

Owda also regularly shares anti-Zionist sentiments on social media, such as falsely accusing Israel of committing genocide and ethnic cleansing in Gaza. She has referred to Israel as “IsraHell” several times and to the Israel Defense Forces as the “terrorist army of Israelis.” In an Instagram post last week, Owda claimed that Israel was carrying out “massacres every second” in Gaza, and “violating the laws of humanity and the entire universe.” She concluded the post by saying, “Long live our martyrs.”

“The Emmys decision to honor someone with clear ties to a US-designated terrorist group is inexcusable and should have never happened,” CCFP Executive Director Ari Ingel told TheWrap. “It would be legitimizing a terrorist organization.”

“If the Emmys don’t change course and rescind this nomination, they will be glorifying someone who is a member of an organization that has carried our numerous aircraft hijackings, participated in the Oct. 7 massacre in Israel, carried out waves of bombings on markets and restaurants and murdered innocent women and children,” Angel added. “The Emmys cannot allow their prestigious award show to be highjacked by terrorists, and instead should continue to promote peace and tolerance through the arts.”

The PFLP has been a US-designated terrorist organization since 1997 and is also a designed terror group by the EU, Canada, and Israel. PFLP terrorists participated in the deadly Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attacks in Israel and were reportedly involved in illegally holding Israeli hostages who were abducted by Hamas on Oct. 7 and taken to the Gaza Strip, according to NGO Monitor. The PFLP has been responsible for suicide bombings, shootings, and assassinations, and became notorious for hijacking commercial airlines in the 1960s and 1970s.

CCFP Chairman and Co-Founder David Renzer told TheWrap that by giving Owda an Emmy nomination despite her “documented terrorism ties,” NATAS is acting “unfathomably irresponsible,” while also “condoning violence and helping to normalize PFLP terrorism around the globe.” CCFP also argued that Owda’s Emmy nomination violates NATAS’ code of ethical conduct, which says that NATAS has “zero tolerance for discrimination, harassment or illegal, dishonest, unethical or otherwise harmful conduct.”

NATAS is the sister organization of the Television Academy, which administers the Primetime Emmy Awards. NATAS is responsible for the Daytime Emmys, Sports Emmys, and News and Documentary Emmys.

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