An 80-minute documentary about alleged AI-assisted targeting of Palestinians in Gaza has received an ovation reported at either 24.5 minutes or 25 minutes after its Venice Film Festival premiere on September 10, 2026. Accounts described the response to NAZA as the longest recorded at Venice, or as a new record beyond a previous 23–24 minute ovation for another film about Gaza. It remains unclear whether Venice or Guinness World Records will formally recognise a record.
NAZA was directed by the Israeli filmmakers Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor. The film was added to Venice’s competition programme a month before the festival began. It is produced by The Guardian and James Wilson of JW Films. Jonathan Glazer, an executive producer, embraced Abraham and Szor during the ovation.
The documentary draws on a nearly three-year investigation and testimony from 24 Israeli military and intelligence sources. All spoke on condition that their identities were concealed. Their faces and voices were digitally altered, and they were filmed at night on rooftops in Tel Aviv.
The sources describe an AI-assisted system called ‘Lavender’, which they say used Gaza’s monitored telecommunications network, including phone calls, movements and interactions, to identify assassination targets. One interviewee says the system operated “on a mass scale, like a factory”.
Another source involved in identifying targets describes the process as “like a video game, because everything is done remotely” and “insanely fun”. Military sources in the film said they “witnessed with their own eyes and ears that the homes they were ‘incriminating’ were filled with families”.
Interviewees also describe the destruction of civilian homes, disregard for humanitarian law and a “general atmosphere” of “hatred” towards Palestinians. The title, NAZA, refers to a Hebrew intelligence euphemism for the number of civilians expected to be killed in a particular air strike.
The Israel Defence Forces categorically rejected the film’s allegations. It said decisions to strike are made by humans only. The film does not identify its sources, and their names, roles and the complete technical specifications of the systems they describe remain unknown.
Abraham said he hoped NAZA would lead Western governments to withdraw their backing for Israel and use sanctions to apply pressure. The film arrives amid scrutiny of Israel’s military conduct in Gaza. Gaza’s Health ministry says more than 73,422 Palestinians have been killed there since October 2023, with women and children accounting for half of all casualties. The United Nations considers the ministry’s figures reliable.
Abraham and Szor won an Academy Award in 2025 for No Other Land, a documentary on Israeli settler pogroms in the occupied West Bank made with the Palestinian co-directors Basel Adra and Hamdan Ballal. Their new film brings allegations from Israeli military and intelligence insiders into one of cinema’s most prominent competition settings, while leaving the central claims firmly contested by the Israeli military.
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