Israel's Culture Minister Threatens to Revoke Citizenship of Gaza Doc Filmmakers
The film won the Special Jury Prize at the Venice Film Festival on Saturday. It reveals 'in detail the systems behind Israel's calculated mass killing of Palestinian civilians in Gaza' following the events of October 7, according to its synopsis
Israel's Culture Minister Miki Zohar threatened Sunday to revoke the citizenship of Oscar-winning filmmakers Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor after their documentary film "NAZA"won the Special Jury Prize at the Venice Film Festival on Saturday.
Writing on X, Zohar described the film as "vile," saying it "constitutes treason."
"This is exactly the reason I led the important reform in cinema so that Israeli citizens will no longer have to pay out of their own pockets for the harm to IDF soldiers and the State of Israel," Zohar said, referring to his reform of government funding for the local movie industry.
According to promotional materials, the film details the "systems behind Israel's calculated mass killing of Palestinian civilians in Gaza," and features testimony from IDF intelligence officers and soldiers.
Abraham said earlier on Sunday that the film crew will do "everything" to distribute the movie "as widely as possible" in Israel, as it received condemnation from Israeli politicians and public figures for accusing "IDF soldiers of genocide" in Gaza.
In his first response after the award ceremony, Abraham said that it is important that Israelis "listen to the [IDF] soldiers" appearing in the movie.
The soldiers and officers "spoke in Hebrew because they wanted to reach out to the Israeli public. They wanted [Israelis] to hear what they did in Gaza," he added.
Opposition MK and former Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman called Abraham and Szor "haters of Israel" and accused them of turning the October 7 massacre into a blood libel against Israel.
Yoseph Haddad, a media personality who joined Ofer Winter's right-wing Amcha Yisrael party earlier this month, also took to X, writing that Abraham and Szor "created an appalling movie whose whole purpose is to accuse IDF soldiers of genocide."
"The two know that the formula for winning an international award is creating a film that slanders the soldiers," he added.
Chairman of the leftist Hadash party congratulated the directors on the award, thanking them for "before the eyes of millions of people these horrific crimes and the brutal reality in Gaza."
The film premiered at the Venice Film Festival on Thursday, earning a record-breaking 25-minute standing ovation.
Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor stand by their reporting in #VeniceFilmFestival winner ‘NAZA’ in face of Israeli army denial. “Just over these past 10 days of the festival, Israel killed 6 Palestinian children in Gaza,” said Abraham.
"The core of the film is a system of killing that has killed more than 70,000 Palestinians in Gaza – estimates say the real number is much higher – the way it worked and the way the world allowed it to happen," Abraham said in the news conference after the film. "This is the heart of what we want to do."
"NAZA" broke a previous festival record set by another film that deals with Palestinian civilians killed in Gaza – "The Voice of Hind Rajab," which tells the true story of a young girl trapped in a car in Gaza under Israeli fire, and received an ovation surpassing 20 minutes when it premiered in Venice last year.