Lemon Tree (2008 film)
2008 film by Eran Riklis
Lemon Tree (Hebrew: עץ לימון, romanized: 'Etz Limon; Arabic: شجرة ليمون, romanized: 'Shajaret Leimoun) is a 2008 drama film directed by Eran Riklis, co-written by Suha Arraf. Starring Hiam Abbass, Ali Suliman, Danny Leshman and Rona Lipaz-Michael, it follows the legal efforts of a Palestinian widow to stop the Israeli Defense Minister, her new next door neighbor, from destroying the lemon trees in her family farm. At the same time, she develops a human bond with the minister's wife.
The film is loosely based on a true story where trees were finally uprooted in the interest of Shaul Mofaz, Israeli Defense Minister from 2002 to 2006.
The film had its world premiere in the Panorama section of the 58th Berlin International Film Festival, and was theatrically released in Israel on 27 March 2008. It received a tepid response from Israeli audiences, but was well received internationally. It was nominated for Best Actress (Abbass) and Best Screenwriter at the 21st European Film Awards.
Plot
The Israeli Defense Minister Israel Navon (Doron Tavory) moves to a house on the border between Israel and the West Bank, with the building sitting on the Israeli side just next to the dividing line. The Israeli Secret Service views the neighboring lemon grove of Salma Zidane (Hiam Abbass), a Palestinian widow whose family has cared for the area for generations, as a threat to the minister and his wife. The security forces soon set up a guard post and a fence around the grove.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Lemon Tree (2008 film)” as 2008 film by Eran Riklis. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 8, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1520801. VIAF identifies the subject as 229020720. 3 of 5 selected statements include explicit references; 3 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2008, 2002 and 2006.
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This entry incorporates text from “Lemon Tree (2008 film)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.