Israeli filmmakers Rachel Szor and Yuval Abraham are facing threats of losing their citizenship and calls for prosecution over NAZA, their documentary about Israel’s military campaign in Gaza. The film examines the artificial intelligence systems used by the Israel Defense Forces to select targets after Hamas’s attacks on 7 October 2023.
The pressure on the directors has grown since Israeli leaders branded the film a “blood libel” and “fiction”. Rachel Szor and Yuval Abraham won the special jury prize at the Venice film festival for NAZA on Saturday, but the recognition has not softened the political response at home.
Instead, the film has become part of a wider fight inside Israeli politics, where politicians have weaponised the controversy to outflank each other on the right during an election campaign. The dispute now reaches beyond criticism of a documentary. It includes threats against the filmmakers’ citizenship, calls for prosecution and attacks aimed at their families.
What NAZA examines
NAZA focuses on AI-powered targeting systems used in the bombardment of Gaza. Its title turns possible fatalities into a number per target, linking the film’s name to the way military decisions can reduce human lives to calculations.
Israeli soldiers describe the military accepting large numbers of Palestinian casualties as the price for killing a single Hamas operative. The film places those accounts alongside the scale of the campaign, in which more than 73,000 Palestinians, including more than 20,000 children, have been killed by Israel’s military.
That focus has made the documentary a direct challenge to the way the campaign is defended. The filmmakers are not only examining weapons or software. They are examining how decisions about targets are made, how possible deaths are counted and how responsibility is understood when technology helps shape military action.
Miki Zohar, an Israeli minister, has used language that reflects the film’s central dispute. He said: “They know the house they are bombin”. The unfinished quote points to the argument surrounding the film: whether those carrying out attacks know the human consequences of their decisions and what that knowledge means.
Threats against the filmmakers
Rachel Szor and Yuval Abraham face claims that their work amounts to treason, along with demands that they lose their citizenship. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has threatened to strip anyone who “defames” Israeli soldiers of citizenship, a position that has intensified concern over the directors’ safety and rights.
Far-right activists have targeted the filmmakers’ families with threats. Israel’s domestic intelligence service may also be involved in an investigation into a leak connected to the controversy, adding another layer to a case already involving politicians, soldiers, filmmakers and press-freedom groups.
The Committee to Protect Journalists and 10 other press-freedom groups have warned that Israel must protect its journalists and filmmakers. Their warning places NAZA within a broader question about whether people can document military conduct without facing punishment for what they uncover.
The dispute also raises a basic issue about citizenship. If a government can threaten to remove citizenship from people accused of defaming soldiers, criticism of military action can become a test of political loyalty rather than a matter for public debate. The threats against Szor and Abraham show how quickly that boundary can collapse.
A film caught in a political battle
The response to NAZA has taken place while Israeli politicians compete for support on the right during an election campaign. That setting matters because attacks on the directors are not limited to a debate about the film’s evidence or methods. The controversy has become a tool in a contest over who can present the strongest defence of the military and the state.
Calling the film a “blood libel” and “fiction” rejects its account without addressing the questions it raises about AI-powered targeting. Those questions remain tied to the human cost described in the documentary and to the deaths of more than 73,000 Palestinians, including more than 20,000 children.
Winning the special jury prize at Venice has given Szor and Abraham international recognition, but it has also sharpened the conflict surrounding their work. Their case now stands at the intersection of filmmaking, military technology, political pressure and press freedom.
A documentary about targeting systems should not become grounds for treating its directors as enemies of the state. The threats facing the filmmakers show why protections for journalists and filmmakers matter most when their work challenges powerful institutions.
Based on
- The Guardian view on NAZA’s persecuted directors: journalism is not treason | Editorial — theguardian.com
- ‘This should be condemned by any thinking human’: film industry rallies behind NAZA directors | Movies | The Guardian — theguardian.com
- Israeli minister threatens to strip Israeli film-makers of citizenship over Gaza documentary NAZA | NAZA | The Guardian — theguardian.com
