9.4291 Naza, Truthful Documentary about Israel or Slander?

Naza is a documentary in which two Israelis,  Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor conducted nighttime interviews with 24 people who they said were Israeli soldiers and intelligence officers.  The people they interviewed claimed that the AI system and mobile phone surveillance used by Israel to identify targets in Gaza, led to mass killings of civilians there. 

Yossi Klein Halevi was interviewed by the Italian journalist Giulio Meotti for the newspaper Il Foglio about the “documentary” Naza.  He said

"It is an unusual film: there is no way to verify any of the allegations. “No one is named by their first and last name...  No one mentions specific incidents that can be verified.” Essentially, the filmmakers are telling us: ‘trust us’. And this is where their political stance becomes decisive. Because Yuval Abraham, one of the two, recently gave an interview in Arabic in which he said that his aim is to help shift global public opinion against Israel in order to redress the power imbalance with the Palestinians. To give the Palestinians more power against Israel, by undermining Israel’s position. If that is your political objective and you start from an anti-Zionist position — essentially, from the belief that the country has no right to exist — then I do not trust you in a film that has no way of proving its veracity. Here, the messenger becomes more crucial than the message.”

Sarit Zehavi helped develop procedures for warning civilians ahead of military strikes by Israel.  “The goal of the collateral damage assessment is to reduce it as much as possible,” she said. “There are many people in the IDF whose mission is to prevent or reduce collateral damage as much as possible. These are intelligence officers, operational staff, and artillery and air force personnel. My mission was part of creating the procedures to warn the population,” she said. “If we didn’t care, we would not invest so much effort in doing this, and it was done on both fronts, Gaza and Lebanon,” Zehavi added. She said:  “What is also very unfortunate in this movie is that the context is missing. We fight for our existence, unlike the Americans who fought a war 2,000 miles away from home. Every mistake we make could cost us the lives of our families, and our enemies are using their own people as human shields,” “Unlike Hamas and Hezbollah, who say their intention is to conduct a genocide against Israelis and act accordingly, we don’t educate our children, who eventually become soldiers, to do so. 

The reason civilians in Gaza die is because Hamas leaders like Yahya Sinwar see them as a necessary sacrifice in the Islamic war of genocide against Israel.

This web page has many embedded videos that discuss different reasons that the Naza film cannot be trusted.

Bereaved father Brig. Gen. (res.) Dedi Simchi launched a scathing attack on i24NEWS against the creators of the anti-Israel documentary “NAZA", arguing that a harsh response is needed against them.

“I expected a much bigger uproar over those two pieces of scum who made the film NAZA. They shouldn't even be allowed in the State of Israel," Simchi declared, labeling the filmmakers “utterly brazen hypocrites." He added, “The State of Israel paid with the lives of male and female soldiers because of how cautious it was, and now these audacious hypocrites come around telling stories. Let's see if they have the courage to step foot into Gaza - and see what happens to them there....  “If our forces had actually acted the way these idiots claim, then over the past three years, there would be hundreds fewer bereaved fathers like me,"

Simchi concluded.

Southern Command chief Maj. Gen. Yaniv Asor  said:

"Hamas is deployed at the heart of a population that supports it, sympathizes with it and identifies with it. Hamas is not an 'outsider' in Gaza. It grew out of it, grew up and was educated there, within a radical and murderous Islamic culture. And yes, there are also those there who oppose its path, but they are unable to influence reality." Asor also addressed the controversy surrounding the film "Naza," which presented serious allegations against the IDF. "In many respects, it can be said that we are raising the banner of the right of an enlightened, democratic, value-driven and moral state to defend itself, to fight without fear in order to defeat a terrorist organization that seeks to destroy it and whose arsenal contains nothing but barbaric, base, inhuman and immoral murder. "And within all this war, we insist on keeping our camp pure, distinguishing between the enemy and those who are not involved, striking the enemy and thwarting it, while at the same time doing everything in our power to minimize harm to those who are not involved. Hamas, by contrast, cynically uses civilians as human shields and as cover for itself. It benefits if they are harmed, and it benefits if we refrain from harming them and its operatives..."Heads of the local authorities and residents of the Negev, our role is to enable you to live here in security-to raise children, work, build and prosper. This is the purpose for which we are fighting. We are here, and in order to ensure, with humility and full commitment, that never again-and never again!-Happy and blessed New Year."

Benny Gantz wrote:

“As a former IDF Chief of Staff and Defense Minister, I state unequivocally: IDF soldiers and commanders are among the most moral, humane and principled fighters in the world. How do I know? Because I was there. I know the IDF's operations in Gaza in detail - before October 7, and even more so afterward,"

According to the IDF, the film “relies on anonymous testimonies from individuals whose identity cannot be verified," including whether they served in the IDF, “in what capacity, or whether they were involved in the matters about which the allegations are being made." The IDF also challenged the substance of some of the testimony, saying that excerpts cited from the film include “claims regarding national and military strategy that are clearly beyond the knowledge of junior-level soldiers."

“A soldier who witnesses a violation of the law is required under military orders to report it so that the need to open an investigation can be examined," the IDF said, adding: “This also applies to individuals who were interviewed for the film." The military also directly rejected allegations concerning the use of artificial intelligence in the approval of strikes. “Decisions regarding the selection and approval of strikes in the IDF are made by human personnel only, in accordance with IDF guidelines, and not by artificial intelligence," it said.

Naza accused Israel for approving strikes with enormous collateral damage to get one Hamas terrorists.  In the following clip the point is made that Israel goes through the trouble of determining collateral damage because it wants to minimize it.  The point is made that Hamas doesn't try and determine collateral damage before deciding whether to do a strike or not. 

Natasha Nausdorff Natasha Hausdorff is a British barrister, international law specialist, and legal director of UK Lawyers for Israel.  In the video below she discusses Naza and explains what's wrong with it.

Some of the points she made are that the laws of war demand that armies calculate possible collateral damage before making a strike.  Calculating civilian harm is the way a military complies with the rule of proportionality.  Israel, as a result of these calculations, has aborted many strikes.  In order to minimize collateral damage Israel has gone through great lengths to warn civilians to leave.  A military that doesn't estimate collateral damage is operating outside international law.  If you intend wanton destruction you wouldn't work out target by target what population was there.  You would just drop the bomb.  She points out if you decided that all collateral damage was unacceptable than you'd have to surrender to an enemy that uses civilians as human shields. 

Andrew Fox is a former British Army Major, conflict researcher, and defense analyst who specializes in the Middle East, military strategy, and disinformation. [1, 2]  Andrew Fox points out in the video below that Naza inadvertantly proved that Israel isn't conducting genocide.  If you are conducting genocide than you are targetting civilians.  He says  that if you do collateral damage estimates than that means your targets are military and you are trying to minimize civilian casualties.

Fiamma Nirenstein was interviewed by Alex Trainman of JNS about Naza.  Alex said that the movie actually said that Israelis were choosing targets in order to deliberately kill women and children.  The more extreme the allegations of cruelty the more likely the allegations are being made by someone who wants to slander Israel.  Trainman said a lot of people interviewed in Europe didn't know about the massacre of Israelis on October 7.  Anti-israel propaganda leaves out what Hamas did to start the conflict.

“But when they offer you 10 shekels for every extra person that you mention, say 400, you get 4,000 shekels; say 500, you get 5,000,” he said. “So people start exaggerating. They see the cash right in front of them; what can you do?”

Discussing airstrikes, the man said, “I can tell you that collateral damage figures of 400 or 500 don’t exist.” He identified the strike that killed Mohammed Deif as the worst case he knew of, saying it caused about 90 casualties and that roughly half were terrorists.

Asked directly about his involvement, he replied, “Yes, I took part in the film, unfortunately. And they manipulated me so much.”

“NAZA” alleges that the IDF uses AI to select airstrikes in ways that maximize civilian casualties.

It won an award after debuting at the Venice International Film Festival last week, where it received nearly 25 minutes of applause.

 John Spencer is an expert on urban warfare who has been to Gaza several times and says Israel has the lowest civilian to combatant ratio.  If the claims made by the creators of Naza were true, that would not be the case.

Here is a video that interviews a person who was involved in collateral damage estimation in Israel.  His says that Naza is lies and propaganda and explains why.

Additional Links:
IDF Chief responds to ‘Naza’ film: ‘Baseless lies and manipulations’

IDF tears apart Naza's war crimes claim in detailed rebuttal

A Critique of Naza

NAZA The Documentary | Israeli Soldiers Speak Out

 

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