French sales company MK2 Films has acquired international rights to “NAZA,” a documentary from “No Other Land” directors Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor that examines the mechanics behind Israeli airstrikes on Gaza. The film joins the Venice Film Festival’s competition lineup as the sole documentary feature vying for the Golden Lion, with its world premiere set for September 10.
Filmed covertly at night on rooftops across Tel Aviv, “NAZA” takes its name from a military acronym Israeli intelligence reportedly uses to estimate expected civilian deaths before authorizing an airstrike. The production draws on investigative work published between 2023 and 2025 by the Israeli-Palestinian outlet +972 Magazine, the Hebrew-language site Local Call, and The Guardian, which also produced the film alongside James Wilson of JW Films. Jonathan Glazer, the Oscar-winning director of “The Zone of Interest,” serves as executive producer.
Festival organizers confirmed the selection only this week, following roughly a month of unresolved safety concerns tied to the screening. Abraham and Szor previously co-directed “No Other Land” with Palestinian filmmakers Basel Adra and Hamdan Ballal, chronicling the demolition of homes in the West Bank’s Masafer Yatta region. That film premiered at the Berlin Film Festival in 2024 and went on to win the Academy Award for best documentary feature.
MK2 chief executive Nathanaël Karmitz and managing director Fionnuala Jamison praised the new film’s craftsmanship, saying it stood out for its cinematic rigor alongside the strength of its testimony. Some of the underlying claims in “NAZA” have drawn pushback from the Israeli military, which has disputed portions of the reporting the filmmakers relied on.
The premiere lands amid renewed diplomatic friction over Israel’s conduct in Gaza. The UK, Australia, and Canada recently condemned Israeli authorities for declining to pursue criminal charges over a strike that killed World Central Kitchen aid workers, a decision that has intensified scrutiny of the military’s internal review process. Venice has also become a recurring flashpoint for the war, with filmmakers and demonstrators pressing festival leadership last year to take a firmer public stance against the conflict.
