Cast member Olivia Colman attends the world premiere of “Wonka,” at Royal Festival Hall, in London, Britain, Nov. 28, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Maja Smiejkowska

Javier Bardem, Olivia Colman, Emma Stone, Brian Cox, and Ayo Edebiri are among the more than 2,500 film industry professionals who pledged on Monday not to work with Israeli film institutions and companies that they claim are “implicated in genocide and apartheid against the Palestinian people.”

Oscar, BAFTA, Emmy, Cannes, Berlin, Venice, César, Goya, and Peabody Award winners are included in the list of film industry figures who signed an open letter about the pledge that was published on Monday by a group called Film Workers for Palestine. The signatories include Mark Ruffalo, Peter Sarsgaard, Tilda Swinton, Cynthia Nixon, Alyssa Milano, and Lily Gladstone. Jewish Hollywood figures such as Ilana Glazer and Hannah Einbinder have also signed the pledge, as well as vocal critics of Israel who had made antisemitic comments in the past such as Susan Sarandon, Miriam Margolyes, and Ken Loach.

Others who signed the pledge include prominent writer-directors Yorgos Lanthimos, Adam McKay, Ava DuVernay, and Joshua Oppenheimer; producers James Wilson, Robyn Slovo and Tracey Seaward; and Oscar-nominated producer-director Mike Lerner. The group said they pledge not to screen films or to appear at or work with Israeli film institutions — including festivals, cinemas, broadcasters, and production companies – complicit in alleged “genocide and apartheid” against Palestinians.

“It is the responsibility of every independently minded artist to use whatever powers of expression they possess to support the global resistance to overcome this horror,” said Lerner in a released statement. “This pledge is an essential non-violent tool to undermine the deadly impunity that Israel and its allies currently enjoy.”

The open letter began by stating that “in this urgent moment of crisis, where many of our governments are enabling the carnage in Gaza, we must do everything we can to address complicity in that unrelenting horror.”

“We answer the call of Palestinian filmmakers, who have urged the international film industry to refuse silence, racism, and dehumanization, as well as to ‘do everything humanly possible’ to end complicity in their oppression,” the letter stated. Examples of complicity allegedly include “whitewashing or justifying genocide and apartheid, and/or partnering with the government committing them,” as written in a footnote of the open letter.

Film Workers for Palestine said Monday’s pledge was inspired by Filmmakers United Against Apartheid, a group founded by Jonathan Demme, Martin Scorsese, and 100 other filmmakers in 1987 who refused to distribute and screen their films in apartheid South Africa.

On a FAQ page, Film Workers for Palestine claimed that most Israeli film production and distribution companies, institutions, sales agents, and cinemas benefit from “Israel’s system of apartheid” and have never “endorsed the full, internationally recognized rights of the Palestinian people.”

Jewish screenwriter and director David Farr, who also signed the pledge, said, “As the descendant of Holocaust survivors, I am distressed and enraged by the actions of the Israeli state, which has for decades enforced an apartheid system on the Palestinian people whose land they have taken, and which is now perpetuating genocide and ethnic cleansing in Gaza. In this context I cannot support my work being published or performed in Israel.”