Toronto Film Fest Hit by Protest Over Oct. 7 Doc as Israeli, Palestinian Flags, Accusations Fly

Pro-Palestinian and pro-Israeli protesters, chanting and holdings signs and flags, faced off on Wednesday at the Toronto Film Festival before a world premiere for the Oct. 7 documentary The Road Between Us: The Ultimate Rescue kicked off at Roy Thomson Hall.

Around 100 Toronto police officers, on foot, bicycles and horseback, attempted to corral the opposing protesters on Simcoe Street as each side tried to shout down one another with sound systems and megaphones over the film about a retired Israeli general on a mission to save his family on Oct. 7, 2023.

Tension and enmity between the opposing activists quickly rose with only metal barricades and lines of police officers keeping the feuding sides apart. Closer to Roy Thomson Hall, film-goers with tickets to the Canadian doc faced a long wait as they passed through metal detectors and had their bags searched before getting into the high profile TIFF venue.

An organizer of the pro-Palestine protest against the TIFF world premiere told The Hollywood Reporter they opposed what they regarded as Israeli propaganda with director Barry Avrich’s documentary. “This protest is here to help educate people to what’s happening and to clarify the misinformation and the Israeli propaganda,” Anas, as the organizer identified himself, argued.

Winston Siegel, a pro-Israeli counter-protester, defended the Canadian documentary as it had a controversial world premiere at TIFF. “It’s a very legitimate story of a man trying to save his family under horrendous circumstances. That’s the story they want to represent as propaganda,” Siegel told THR.

The Canadian documentary centers on retired Israeli general Noam Tibon rescuing his family, including his son, from Hamas terrorists on Oct. 7, 2023, when they invaded kibbutz Nahal Oz. TIFF organizers sparked opposition with an earlier decision not to screen the film at its 2025 edition after issuing an invitation to the filmmaker.

After an uproar from the Toronto Jewish community, Toronto reached an agreement with Avrich over security and footage clearance concerns to allow the reinstatement of the film in the official lineup. The result on Wednesday was the loud, yet peaceful protest and counter-protest that TIFF organizers had longed to avoid as colliding supporters of Palestinians and Israelis looked to noisily flood the zone outside Roy Thomson Hall.

Meir Weinstein, founder of Israel Now and an organizer of the counter-protest by Israeli supporters, said opposing pro-Palestinian protesters were out to “whitewash” the actions of Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023. “They want to say, ‘no, no. Hamas never did that. We’re innocent, sweet people. But they hate Jews. They want Israel totally destroyed, and that’s why they’re here,” Weinstein told THR.

On the other side of the barricades outside Roy Thomson Hall, Tarek Haj Ebrahim, another pro-Palestine protester, reiterated that the Canadian documentary was part of Israel’s propaganda campaign. “The whole movie is fake and false information. We’ve been in this conflict for 100 years. We know how they flip facts, how they falsify history,” Ebrahim insisted.  

Hamas terrorists on Oct. 7, 2023, killed around 1,200 Israelis, including civilians and Israel Defence Force soldiers. That was followed by the Israeli-Gaza war, which to date has claimed the lives of around 64,000 Palestinians, including ordinary Gazans, according to the local health authority.