Documentary on Israel’s Systematic Killing of Palestinians: Venice 83 Surprise Competition Entry

Those who, out of curiosity, necessity, or work, had recently started combing through the projection calendar of the Venice Film Festival 2026, had noticed that in the slot usually reserved for films in competition on September 10 there appeared a mysterious “film to be announced”. Well, the film in question, which adds to those already known contending for the Golden Lion and the other prizes of Venice 83, is a documentary that is sure to generate interest and controversy.
The documentary is titled NAZA and, according to the Biennale’s press release, was shot at night on the rooftops of Tel Aviv and “reveals in detail the systems behind the calculated mass killing of Palestinian civilians by Israel in Gaza”. It was directed by Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor, two of the four co-directing filmmakers of the documentary No Other Land, winner of the Oscar 2025, while the production is credited to the British newspaper The Guardian and James Wilson (JW Films), with executive producer Jonathan Glazer (Wilson and Glazer are the Oscar-winning team for The Zone of Interest).
Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor join nine other directors (out of 21 films) taking part for the first time in the Venice Film Festival Competition, alongside Casey Affleck, Ali Asgari, Danny Boyle, May el-Toukhy, Cedric Kahn, Ilya Khrzhanovsky, Lance Oppenheim, Nicolas Pariser and Paolo Strippoli.