Naza and the Function of Perpetrator Cinema

Naza, a film by Israeli filmmakers Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor, features interviews with 24 members of elite intelligence units in the Israeli military describing the mechanics of carrying out remote, indiscriminate mass killing in Gaza. Since news spread of a 25-minute standing ovation for the film at the Venice Film Festival, it has provoked intense debate, with some Palestinians expressing criticism of the way that Israelis’ confessions have made the genocide more “real” in the West than Palestinians’ own testimony. Meanwhile, in Israel, the film has elicited disturbing incitement against the filmmakers (who currently remain abroad), and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has threatened to revoke the filmmakers’ citizenship.

What is the unique function of cinema focused on the perpetrators of genocide? How do we understand the concept of “evil” in listening to the voices of the murderers? And can these testimonies provoke a reckoning within global Jewry? To discuss these questions, Arielle Angel speaks with two filmmakers: Rami Younis, Palestinian journalist and co-director of the film Lyd, about the city in historic Palestine, now in the south of Israel; and Joshua Oppenheimer, director of the Oscar-nominated films The Act of Killing and The Look of Silence, about the Indonesian genocide.

Thanks to Jesse Brenneman for editing and to Nathan Salsburg for the use of his song “VIII (All That Were Calculated Have Passed).”

Links and Further Reading

Naza, directed by Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor

The Act of Killing and The Look of Silence, directed by Joshua Oppenheimer and Anonymous

Lyd, directed by Rami Younis and Sarah Ema Friedland

“Gaza before and after: New Google Maps imagery shows destruction of the Strip,” José A. Álvarez and Anna Navarro, El País

Mosab Abu Toha’s post on X

“‘NAZA’ is forcing Israelis to reflect. But we Palestinians are not your mirror,” Ayat Abou Shmeiss, +972 Magazine

“The moment a human life becomes ‘collateral damage,’” Mahmoud Mushtaha, +972 Magazine

Mairav Zonszein post on X