Biography

Maha Haj was born in Nazareth in 1969. She graduated from the University of Jerusalem in English and Arabic literature. She worked as an artistic collaborator on the films Le Temps qu’il reste by Elia Suleiman, L’Attentat by Ziad Douairi, and On the Hill by Rafael Nadjari. She wrote and directed the short documentaries Oranges (2009) and Behind these Walls (2010). In 2016 she directed her first feature film Personal Affairs selected for “Un Certain Regard” in the official selection of the Cannes Film Festival. The film went on to win Best Film at the Haifa Festival and the Critics’ Prize at the Montpellier Festival. In 2021 she directed Fièvre méditerranéenne, which won the Screenplay Prize at the Cannes Festival in the “Un Certain Regard” section in 2022. She is currently developing her third feature film.