Iris Zaki is an Israeli film maker. She is best known for her film Unsettling which is a documentary about Zaki (a left wing Israeli) living in the Israeli settlement of Tekoa for two months.[1] An earlier film by Zaki, Women in Sink, received 13 awards and has been screened at over 120 festivals and universities. Zaki teaches ethnographic and documentary filmmaking.[2]
Zaki completed her PhD at Royal Holloway, University of London. She wrote her doctoral dissertation on whether it was possible to film a conversation without creating the feel of an interview. She calls the technique "The Abandoned Camera".[3] While filming Unsettling Zaki says, "It took a long time for people to calm down and feel comfortable with my presence".[3]
Zaki's is the granddaughter to Jewish Egyptian singer Souad Zaki and Muslim Egyptian qanun player Mohammed Elakkad. Her father Moshe Zaki is a psychologist in Haifa and her brother Uri Zaki is a political activist and former representative of B'Tselem in Washington.[4]