The Delusion Perpetuated by NAZA
The controversy surrounding NAZA is not difficult to understand. The film presents itself as a serious account of Israel and the war in Gaza, yet its framing appears less interested in examining a painful and complex conflict than in delivering a predetermined verdict. The result is not simply criticism of Israeli policy. It is a profoundly anti-Zionist work that treats Israel’s actions in isolation while pushing aside the events, motives, and difficult realities that shaped them.
That distinction matters.
Israel, like every nation, can be criticized. Its government’s decisions, military conduct, and political failures are legitimate subjects of public debate. No country is exempt from scrutiny during war, particularly when civilians are suffering. But scrutiny is not the same as advocacy dressed up as documentary filmmaking. A credible film tests claims, identifies sources, acknowledges contradictory evidence, and gives viewers enough context to reach their own conclusions. When a film relies only on unverifiable testimony and emotionally charged allegations, it asks its audience to accept a narrative rather than evaluate one.
The problem is not that testimony has no value. Firsthand accounts can reveal truths that official statements obscure. But testimony becomes less reliable when identities, backgrounds, or claims cannot be independently verified. Viewers deserve to know who is speaking, how the filmmakers confirmed that person’s account, and whether other available evidence supports it. It is the minimum standard we should apply to any documentary making grave accusations.
In NAZA, that standard is, at best, weak. The audience is encouraged to accept the film’s witnesses as credible without being given tools to assess their credibility. We may be told that a speaker is Israeli, a soldier, a victim, or a witness, but a label supplied by filmmakers is not verification. In a conflict saturated with propaganda, selective editing, fabricated claims, and manipulated images, the burden on filmmakers should be higher, not lower.
What makes the response to the film especially troubling is the reported 25-minute ovation and the award it received. Applause is not proof, of course. Festivals often reward emotional force, political relevance, or artistic ambition. Still, such an overwhelming reception raises an uncomfortable question: Did those applauding apply the same moral attention to the atrocities that triggered this war?
Did they watch the footage recorded by Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad attackers as they crossed into Israel on October 7, 2023? Did they confront the killing of civilians, the taking of hostages, and reports of sexual violence and mutilation? Did they hear the voices of families whose relatives were murdered or dragged into Gaza? Those events are not incidental. They are essential to understanding why Israel went to war and why Israelis view Hamas not as a conventional political opponent, but as an armed group committed to terrorizing their society.
Acknowledging October 7 does not settle every question about the proportionality, wisdom, or legality of Israel’s response. It does establish the context that any honest account must include. A film that magnifies one population’s pain while reducing another’s to a minor footnote is not offering moral clarity. It is choosing which victims deserve the audience’s empathy.
War is hell. That phrase can sound hollow, but its meaning is painfully concrete: civilians die, families are displaced, neighborhoods are destroyed, and truth itself becomes contested territory. Israel’s conduct should be examined. So should Hamas’s strategy of operating within densely populated areas, its treatment of hostages, its attacks on civilians, and its public claims about casualties.
Casualty figures from Gaza must also be handled carefully. Much of the data originates with authorities controlled by Hamas. That does not mean every figure is false, nor does it mean civilian deaths should be dismissed. It does mean filmmakers should be transparent about the source, the uncertainty surrounding distinctions between civilians and fighters, and the difficulty of independently verifying claims during an active war. Treating disputed figures as unquestionable fact may strengthen a narrative, but it does not strengthen the truth.
The deeper problem with NAZA is the worldview beneath it. The film appears to begin with a conclusion about Zionism and Israel, then selects the testimony and imagery needed to support that conclusion. It does not merely accuse a particular government or military unit of wrongdoing. It places suspicion on the legitimacy of Jewish national self-determination itself.
That is where anti-Zionist rhetoric can intersect with history’s oldest prejudices. Antisemitism has always adapted to the language of its era. At different times, Jews have been portrayed as disloyal, conspiratorial, greedy, racially inferior, or collectively guilty. Today, similar patterns emerge through claims that treat Israel as uniquely illegitimate, deny Jewish people rights granted to other peoples, or hold Jews everywhere responsible for decisions made by an Israeli government.
Even Jews are not immune to absorbing these ideas. Membership in a targeted group does not automatically protect anyone from social pressure, ideological fashion, or a one-sided presentation of history.
This is why the language of delusion is relevant. A delusion is a belief maintained despite compelling evidence that contradicts it. When filmmakers omit crucial context, rely on claims that cannot be tested, and present one side’s suffering as the whole truth, they create a sealed moral universe. Within it, conflicting facts are not examined. They are excluded.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is too consequential, and the suffering too real, to be reduced to delusional propaganda. A film may be moving, and enthusiastically applauded while still being intellectually dishonest and delusional.
NAZA deserves scrutiny not because Israel must be protected from criticism, but because serious criticism must be grounded in evidence. When a documentary asks us to judge a nation, a people, or a political movement, emotion cannot be the only standard. Facts matter. Context matters. And applause, no matter how long it lasts, cannot turn a predetermined narrative into the truth.
