Torn: The Israel-Palestine Poster War on New York City Streets(2025)

Torn: The Israel-Palestine Poster War on New York City Streets Synopsis

After Hamas kidnapped 251 people from Israel on October 7, and as Israel’s war in Gaza unfolded, a conflict thousands of miles away erupted on New York’s walls. TORN captures the emotional fallout of the now-iconic “KIDNAPPED” poster campaign - a grassroots act of solidarity that quickly became a flashpoint, igniting fierce confrontations between pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian New Yorkers. Through the voices of artists, activists, and hostage families, the film unpacks the motivations behind those putting up and tearing down the posters, exposing a complex proxy war fought in stickers, slogans, and torn paper. By revealing how a distant war fractured daily life in one of the world’s most diverse cities, the film forces a reckoning with identity, free speech, and empathy in an age of polarization.

Torn: The Israel-Palestine Poster War on New York City Streets (2025) is a documentary film directed by Nim Shapira, released on September 5, 2025 with a runtime of 1h 16m. Viewers rate it 7.0 out of 10 across 2 ratings.