The Israeli film “Ajami” has made the first cut in the Oscar race.

The nine semi-finalists in the foreign-language film category, including the Israeli film, were announced Wednesday.

The nine movies were selected from among 65 entries and will be winnowed down to five when all Oscar nominations are announced Feb. 2.

“Ajami” paints an unsparing picture of Arab-Jewish and intra-Arab tensions in a mixed quarter of Jaffa. Its co-directors are two young Israelis, Scandar Copti, a Christian Arab, and Yaron Shani, who is Jewish.

Also named was Germany’s “The White Ribbon,” which won the 2010 Golden Globe for best foreign movie. The film by Michael Haneke is set in a rustic German village in 1914, whose seemingly placid life holds the seeds for the Nazi flowering to come.

The other semi-finalists are: “El Secreto de Sus Ojos” from Argentina; “Samson and Delilah,” from Australia; “The World Is Big and Salvation Lurks Around the Corner,” from Bulgaria; “A Prophet,” from France; “Kelin from Kazakhstan; and “Winter in Wartime,” from The Netherlands, in which a Dutch boy aids a downed British pilot during World War II.