Najwa Najjar (
Arabic: نجوى نجار) is a film writer and director. She was born to a
Jordanian father and
Palestinian mother. She began her career making commercials and has worked in both documentary and fiction since 1999.
Her debut feature film Pomegranates and Myrrh won 10 awards,[which?] and was released theatrically and screened at over 80 international festivals.[1][2][3] When the film was first screened in
Ramallah, there was public outcry by the
Hamas Government in
Gaza[4] over the film's portrayal of "what was deemed its 'unpatriotic' portrayal of an untrustworthy wife of a political prisoner."[5] At the
Doha Tribeca Film Festival, the film won the Best Arab Film award.[6][7]
The 1999 documentary film Naim and Wadee’a was based on Najjar's family and includes the oral histories of Na’im Azar and Wadee’a Aghabi, a couple who were forced to leave their
Jaffa home in 1948. The film won the Award for Films of Conflict and Resolution at the 2000
Hamptons International Film Festival.[8]