Watching NAZA: A Window into Gaza's Killing Machinery 2026

As a Palestinian journalist from Gaza, watching the documentary NAZA was like peering through a window – and seeing the machinery of killing in Gaza laid bare. The film, whose title comes from an Israeli military acronym indicating how many civilians are likely to die in an airstrike, offers a chilling glimpse into the cold calculations behind Israel's destruction of Gaza.

The lights go down, and for a moment I forget I'm watching a screen. It fills with a rooftop in Tel Aviv at night, black and grey. The camera pans down. Through windows, we see people watching screens of their own – couples holding each other close, following the news, eating food. They appear absorbed in their own worlds, and why wouldn't they be? That's the thing I can't get past: this must be it – this must be what safety actually looks like. Just an evening uninterrupted, with no military aircraft flying overhead or drones buzzing incessantly.

Meanwhile, men and women on the rooftop above them calmly talk about how they decided how many Palestinian civilians would die on any given night. These are the soldiers, mostly intelligence officers, who helped Israel carry out its destruction of Gaza. Their testimonies form the basis of NAZA.

The Cold Proficiency of Killing

What surprised me in the film wasn't the massive scale of the killing, or even the coldness of it, but the proficiency of the soldiers who coolly described destroying people's lives as if they were discussing a routine errand. One described the work simply as a "mission", while another compared it to a "video game". One soldier recounted how they would calculate the number of civilians likely to be killed in a strike, and then decide whether it was worth it.

The documentary reveals a bureaucratic process where human lives are reduced to numbers. The soldiers speak with unsettling detachment, their words devoid of empathy. It's a window into a system that normalizes the killing of civilians, turning it into a matter of statistics and tactical decisions.

How NAZA Works: The Acronym Behind the Deaths

NAZA is an Israeli military acronym that stands for "harigot bazeh" – roughly translated as "casualties in this" – and is used to indicate the estimated number of civilians likely to die in an airstrike. The film shows how this calculation is made, and how it influences the decision to strike.

The table above illustrates the stark reality: what the military calls "precision" often means death for innocent families. The NAZA calculation is a key part of the machinery that enables these killings.

Key Takeaways from NAZA

• Dehumanization: The film shows how Palestinians are reduced to numbers, making it easier to justify their deaths.
• Bureaucratic killing: The process of deciding who dies is routinized, with soldiers treating it as just another task.
• Moral disengagement: Soldiers compare airstrikes to video games, distancing themselves from the human cost.
• Complicity of silence: The tranquil scenes in Tel Aviv contrast sharply with the violence being planned, highlighting the disconnect between Israeli society and Gaza's suffering.

These takeaways underscore the documentary's power in exposing the mechanisms of violence. It's not just about the bombs; it's about the mindset that allows them to fall.

FAQ

Watching NAZA was a painful reminder of the reality my people face daily. It's a window into a machinery that grinds human lives into dust. As a journalist, I urge everyone to watch it and bear witness.

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