NAZA Is Just the Tip of the Iceberg

“Believe me, I’m sparing you a lot of things,” one of the anonymous Israeli soldiers says at the end of the first trailer for NAZA, Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor’s searing new documentary about the IDF’s ongoing campaign of violence in Gaza. The new film, by two of the four directors of No Other Land, premiered to rave reviews and a record-breaking standing ovation at the Venice Film Festival, where it was awarded with a Special Jury Prize. The first look at the film shows just how straightforward and sparse the documentary is, focusing on the chilling testimonies of soldiers who participated (and may be still participating) in the genocide in Gaza. NAZA is a continuation of Abraham’s reporting as well as that of Palestinian journalists over the past several years, though the stark approach to bearing witness calls to mind other documentaries like The Act of Killing or Shoah, or narrative features like executive producer Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest.

NAZA, which was produced in part by The Guardian, will be out in theaters in New York on September 30 and Los Angeles on October 9, though Abraham announced on September 24 that the film would be available for free starting in November. “Hiding the truth first and foremost poisons our society and, above all, allows the harm to human beings in Gaza to continue,” he wrote.