SUMMARY
Looted and Hidden investigates the cinematic and other archival treasures that Israel plundered from various Palestinian visual and research institutions in Beirut in the 1980s. The film follows four historical figures who are involved in the fate of these Palestinian archives. Based entirely on archival materials, extensive research, and interviews with the individuals it portrays, Looted and Hidden exposes, for the first time, Palestinian materials that were erased deliberately from the public sphere by Israel and were, for many years, presumed to have been “lost.”
Looted and Hidden explores how Israel plunders Palestinian archives and treasures and conceals Palestinian history from the public sphere through control mechanisms, including seizure, deliberate censorship and classification, restrictions on viewing, prevention of materials being returned to their owners, misinterpretation of indigenous materials, erasure, and more.