I’m the director and executive producer of “October 8.” As a proud Northwestern Medill alum (Medill ’93) and former Daily reporter, I welcome a passionate and broad exchange of ideas. However, as a journalist trained at Medill and steeped in the old-school model of rigor and fact-checking, I find The Daily Northwestern’s Letter to the Editor from sophomore Franke Gordon troubling.

Gordon did not attend the screening of “October 8” and he has never seen the film, which releases to theaters on March 14. He presumptuously asserts that the film “primarily features an Islamophobic and genocide-supporting bigot –– Mosab Hassan Yousef.” To be clear, Yousef is the son of Hamas’ co-founder, Hassan Yousef, and he has witnessed Hamas’ operations up close for decades. Yousef has about 7 minutes of screentime in a 100-minute film.

Gordon also writes that the “documentarians have also recreated one of the longest standing tropes against Middle Easterners claiming ‘this is no longer about Jews or Israel, This is about Western civilization.’” Then Gordon goes on to write, “This rhetoric is nothing new; claiming Muslims are a threat to Western civilization was also used to justify the illegitimate Iraq War and the USA Patriot Act.”

Gordon apparently watched the film’s 2-minute trailer, which is available online, and jumped to conclusions about the film. The lack of critical thinking and deep-seated ideology is what’s problematic in our culture today.

So perhaps it’s not surprising to see a Letter to the Editor like Gordon’s. But, to clarify, “October 8” unpacks how we got to this moment at the most elite universities in America, where Hamas is celebrated as freedom fighters rather than as terrorists. It exposes how Hamas in America has been seeding its messaging and playing the long game for decades, intentionally targeting media institutions and American college campuses.

The film reveals a 1993 FBI wiretap that took place in a Marriott Hotel room in Philadelphia, where viewers can hear Hamas leaders discussing how to appeal to left-wing Americans (use language of apartheid and colonialism) and right-wing Americans (use language of patriotism).

Thirty years ago, Hamas supporters in America were sophisticated and well-funded; today, even more so. Its infiltration into American institutions has paid off. This is evident in the Hamas-supporting toolkit that was circulated after the Oct. 7th attack to Students for Justice in Palestine chapters on college campuses across the U.S.

While I welcome the diversity of opinions, as a journalist who has triple-fact-checked every claim in the film and must go through rounds of legal reviews, I’m appalled that The Daily would accept a letter that’s not only ill-informed but is a dog whistle for hate.

Wendy Sachs is the director and executive producer of “October 8.” She is also a Medill alum and former Daily staffer. If you would like to respond publicly to this op-ed, send a Letter to the Editor to opinion@dailynorthwestern.com. The views expressed in this piece do not necessarily reflect the views of all staff members of The Daily Northwestern.