‘There were some moments where I felt I was literally going to have a heart attack,’ Motaz Malhees, star of The Voice of Hind Rajab, tells me about filming the movie that stormed Venice.
Days after the ceasefire in Gaza was announced, Metro sat down with Motaz to discuss the real cost of the violence that is still going on.
I’m on my way to visit the Palestinian actor at the Sea Containers in London when I see a BBC news story of a 10-year-old boy, Muhammad al-Hallaq, shot dead by Israeli forces despite the professed ceasefire.
Every death is devastating, and there is an oasis of pain in Palestine where he is one of over 18,000 child victims and counting in this conflict, according to local health authorities, as reported by The Guardian last month.
This horrifying reality is not something the world can turn a blind eye to. In fact, in August, a startling new movie, The Voice of Hind Rajab, attempted to break through to the masses at the Venice Film Festival.
Backed by a long list of big-name Hollywood executive producers, including Brad Pitt, Jonathan Glazer, Joaquin Phoenix, Rooney Mara and Alfonso Cuaron, it made history with a 23-minute standing ovation, praised for its unflinching portrayal of the mammoth cost of this war.
For those unfamiliar with the tale, the film dramatises the last hours of six-year-old Palestinian Hind’s life after she and her family came under Israeli military fire while trying to flee their area of the Gaza Strip by car.
Surrounded by the corpses of her loved ones, the child called the Palestine Red Crescent Society in a desperate plea for help as they scrambled to try and rescue her before it was too late.
Days later, her body was found alongside her family in a car riddled with over 330 bullets. Her last words, saved in the audio recordings of her frantic calls, have been immortalised in this eye-opening fictionalisation that leaves you completely gutted.
If you didn’t know this story, you are not alone. As Motaz shares, he only discovered this heartbreaking tale when he was approached about starring as Omar, one of the emergency responders that day.
After landing the role under his dream director, Kaouther Hania, he reached out to the real-life Omar to prepare – and task as difficult as it sounds.
As he explained: ‘I could have done the role, but it wouldn’t be the same for me without talking to [Omar]
‘[When] I told him, “I’m playing you” he was so happy. After the first conversation we had, he disappeared for a day or two. When he returned [he told me] I opened wounds for him, asking questions, so [he] just needed a break.’
The pair have since forged a ‘great friendship’, one Motaz talks about with great warmth and affection.
The filming experience itself was no easier, however. He was sure to emphasise what a ‘great atmosphere’ the director and crew created on set, before caveating that ultimately, ‘there is no escape from the story’.
‘I felt like I was dying on it. Every time I did a scene and I heard her voice, I felt like something was killing me. I died 1000 times in there and was reborn again. There were some moments where I felt I was literally going to have a heart attack,’ he explained.
In the film, we witness the sheer devotion these workers had to saving Hind, but faced with barrier after barrier by the system set up by the IDF (Israeli Defence Forces) to provide an ambulance, they are fighting a losing battle.
Instead, they were forced to listen to the dying pleas of a small child for multiple hours with little hope of saving her.
We have to take small breaks during our chat when the discussion becomes too much – a small reprieve.
The raw emotion of the experience permeates the room, and in the hush of the evening, he admits he’s ‘scared’ of talking to Wessam, Hind’s mother (who supported the project from behind the scenes), although he hopes he’ll be able to speak with her ‘in the future’.
As for many Palestinians, Malhees has losses from his own past he’s had to come to terms with, which even inspired his trajectory as an actor.
He explained: ‘When I was 10, 11 years old, a friend got killed next to me by the army and I felt I needed to do something about it. I wanted to tell his story. I did a play about him when I was a child. From there, I found the key to my life.
‘I ran away from high school, and I went to The Freedom Theatre.’
After making a stand to pursue this as a career, 16 years on, he shared that he feels ‘a responsibility to tell the story of my people’ who face ‘so much dehumanisation’.
Movies like The Voice of Hind Rajab are why he is still acting today.
‘The West needs to understand through this film what’s happening to the Palestinians in the hope that this will never happen to other children.
‘This is a super anti-war, anti-genocide film, and we just want to do something to stop it, so hopefully we are part of the change. I want change. I want freedom. I need to be equal.
‘The world needs to see the truth, so that’s where our role comes in. We need to do something as artists, and that’s what we did.’
More than this, he calls on Hollywood to lead by example and ‘stand up and do something’ like the executive producers of this movie here, sharing how ‘grateful’ he is at the ‘unexpected buzz’ the movie has received so far.
As the death toll continues to rise, Malhees makes clear that ‘while this is happening [he’s] not going to stop doing these kinds of stories’.
Yet, in his dreams of freedom for Palestine one day, he imagines a future for himself starring in projects like Peaky Blinders, Romeo and Juliet – stories other actors have the luxury to choose.
Our conversation ends on a hopeful note, as Malhees put it: ‘We are not less than any one of you. If we are free, we wouldn’t be asking for anything.’
The Voice of Hind Rajab premiered at the BFI London Film Festival. It will arrive in UK cinemas on January 26, 2026.
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