Israeli Culture Minister Miki Zohar has threatened to strip filmmakers Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor of their citizenship after their documentary about Israel’s Gaza offensive received a special jury prize at the Venice Film Festival, according to DW.
Zohar accused the filmmakers of harming Israel to receive praise from antisemites and said on X that he would act to revoke their citizenship for “treason against the state”. National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir also criticised the pair, calling them “a disgrace and an embarrassment”.
The film, titled “NAZA”, includes interviews with 24 Israeli military or intelligence personnel. The filmmakers conducted the interviews anonymously at night on rooftops in Tel Aviv, and the film discusses AI-powered targeting systems used during Israel’s military campaign in Gaza.
Abraham said the intelligence officers portrayed mass killing as systemic and deliberate. Israel’s military rejected the film’s allegations, criticised the use of anonymous testimony and said the identities of the people interviewed could not be verified. The military also denies deliberately targeting civilians.
The documentary concerns Israel’s offensive launched after the Hamas-led attacks of October 7, 2023, which killed about 1,200 people in Israel, according to the supplied report. Gaza officials say more than 73,000 Palestinians, including 20,000 children, have been killed in Israeli attacks since the operation began; DW says the figures are considered broadly reliable by the United Nations.
Israel’s Supreme Court confirmed in 2022 that citizenship can legally be revoked in cases of disloyalty, including espionage or treason. The supplied material does not say that proceedings against the filmmakers have begun or that their citizenship has been revoked.