‘NAZA’ Rebuttal Doc Surfaces Online, Made by IDF Reserve Members

Just as hot-button Gaza documentary “NAZA” — which recently won a special jury prize at the Venice Film Festival — gains international visibility and media attention, a counter project has surfaced online titled “NAZA: The Real Story.” The original 80-minute doc, which was shot at night on the rooftops of Tel Aviv and explores the killings of Palestinian civilians in Gaza, features revelatory interviews with 24 Israeli military intelligence officers and soldiers. “NAZA,” a term that appears throughout the documentary, is an acronym for collateral damage used by Israeli intelligence to indicate the number of civilians it expects will be killed in an airstrike. “NAZA,” which was helmed by Israeli directors Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor — two of the four co-directors of 2025’s Oscar-winning doc “No Other Land” — earned a massive 24.5-minute ovation at Venice and was also well received when it recently bowed in North America at the New York Film Festival. It is currently playing in cinemas in Europe and the U.S. before it will be made visible to stream for free on The Guardian website in late November. Popular on Variety It is now being countered by the rapidly made 49-minute rebuttal “NAZA: The Real Story,” shot in a style that mimics the original. According to information on its website, the film has been made by Lt. Col. Roi Danino, who is a political candidate for the right-wing Israel First party led by Sharren Haskel in Israel’s upcoming Oct. 27 elections; Ariel Averbuch, a reserve major in the Israel Defense Forces, who is a patent attorney and ultra-nationalist influencer; and content editor Hagai Gutman. The documentary was reposted on X by the Israeli Embassy to the U.S. on Saturday, which wrote “a new Israeli documentary is setting the record straight” alongside a link to its website. According to the “NAZA: The Real Story” website, the rebuttal doc, similarly to the original, describes the war in Gaza as “told through the testimonies of IDF officers who took part.” “Through firsthand accounts, this documentary examines combat in civilian areas, the challenges of identifying threats, and the decisions made on the battlefield,” says the blurb on the rebuttal piece’s home page. “Their testimonies offer a closer look at the conditions they faced, the dilemmas they encountered, and how they describe the conduct of the war.” “NAZA: The Real Story” argues that “Hamas fought from inside civilian areas: fighters in civilian clothes, weapons in homes, schools, mosques and a hospital, tunnel shafts inside houses. And that the IDF ran its operations under strict rules for opening fire because of it. Those are the film’s claims, made by the people who were there,” according to the website. At publishing time, the “NAZA: The Real Story” website asserts that more than 20 million viewers have already seen the doc that was released online this weekend. Last week, the Israeli Defense Forces slammed “NAZA” in a statement, calling it “manipulative,” “misleading” and “based on substantial factual errors.” “With the original ‘NAZA’ film gaining heavy distribution and visibility across Europe and the United States, the creators of this rebuttal are utilizing digital influencers and grassroots international networks to push their footage directly to global policymakers and journalists,” wrote the right-wing newspaper Jerusalem Post. “For the production team, the ongoing clash is no longer just a debate over military strategy but a definitive, high-stakes war over who dictates the historical record to the international community.” There was no comment about “NAZA: The Real Story” from Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor and from The Guardian, which produced “NAZA” in tandem with James Wilson (JW Films) and executive producer Jonathan Glazer.