Israeli Minister Zohar criticized the NAZA documentary for receiving the Special Jury Prize at the International Venice Film Festival in a post on his account on the US-based X platform.
Zohar described the documentary as “disgusting” and its receiving the award as “shocking.” Claiming that the documentary amounted to “treason,” Zohar said he would immediately take action to revoke the citizenship of its directors, Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor.
The documentary’s subject
The documentary NAZA examines the military operations in Gaza as genocide and features accounts from Israeli army personnel who say they took part in surveillance and remote-killing mechanisms targeting Palestinians.
The film, which received the Special Jury Prize at the 83rd International Venice Film Festival in Italy, refers in its title to an acronym used in the Israeli army to identify civilians expected to be killed in an attack.
Filming methods and accounts
The documentary was secretly filmed on rooftops in Tel Aviv over three years. The participants’ identities, voices and images were digitally altered for their safety.
People interviewed in the film described the surveillance systems and remote-bombing methods used by the Israeli army in Gaza. They alleged that artificial intelligence was used to identify potential Hamas targets and that homes known to contain families were also bombed.
The documentary also includes statements from Israeli army personnel who said they witnessed settlements used by Gazans as shelters being deliberately burned and people being killed during food distribution. It said that some of the participants had worked in secret intelligence units and were directly subordinate to Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu.
