Since the tragic attack on Israeli civilians and soldiers by Hamas terrorists, director Guy Nattiv has dedicated himself to spreading the truth about the events. He operates from what he calls a “war room” in his home office. On his Instagram page, he’s transformed it into a “Missing Persons” wall. The difference is, we all know where most of them are – in Gaza, held hostage by Hamas.
The news of the attack in Israel reached Nattiv while he was at his friend Florian Zeller’s house, the director of “The Father and The Son.” It was a Friday night around 10 pm when Nattiv began receiving text messages like “It’s Golda 2” and images of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s face superimposed on Golda Meir’s. “I started getting one text message after another and didn’t know what was happening. So, I opened Ynet (popular Israeli news media – A.O.), and saw that there was an attack on Israel. I was shocked. I told my wife we had to go back home. Since then, I don’t leave my office.”
Nattiv, who won an Oscar for his live-action short film “Skin” in 2018, released his latest film, “Golda,” on August 25, 2023. The film chronicles Golda Meir’s failure to heed warnings about the threat from its’ neighboring Arab countries in 1973 and the inadequate preparation for a war, drawing parallels to the current government’s failure to take the threat posed by Hamas seriously and to adequately prepare for such an attack. This situation is eerily similar to what’s happening now. Nattiv is acutely aware of this. He noted, “It’s like 50 years haven’t passed. The arrogance, the deafness, the blindness, the government that can’t see one meter ahead – it’s unbelievably similar. What’s really upsetting is that there are still people who deny that it happened.”
Academy Award-nominated director Farah Nabulsi posted a false video filled with lies. It claims that “250 people were not murdered at the music festival in the Negev, that it’s all false.” Nattiv posted the story on his Instagram account and asked his followers to help remove her post. Many of his friends reported her to Instagram and eventually it was removed but the situation was a stark reminder of the Holocaust and those who denied it.
“It brought me back to my grandparents in Poland during those dark times. My grandma used to tell me, ‘Our neighbors saw what happened and nobody said a word. People denied that there was even a Holocaust.’ It immediately took me to that place, and I knew I had to do something. I want to be a ‘Shofar’ for all those who were murdered and those who were kidnapped. My Instagram wall is full of stories of missing people, whose relatives don’t yet know what happened to them, and stories of people who lost their lives.”
He went on to share the story of a grandmother who was shot to death inside her home. She had woken up on a Saturday morning, had tea, and was shot to death inside her home. “The terrorist took a picture and posted it on Facebook Live. That’s how her grandchildren learned of her death.”
I wish people would be more vocal and express their support of Israel. As Amy Schumer put it in her post, ‘You don’t have to be anti-Palestinian to support Israel right now.
Many celebrities, especially those who aren’t Jewish, hesitate to show their support because they fear the backlash. Nattiv scoffs at this: “Famous Jews have no problem posting their support publicly,” he said. “However there are celebrities who refrain from posting anything, some because they might not support Israel, and some because they are afraid to lose followers or receive negative comments. I wish people would be more vocal and express their support of Israel. As Amy Schumer put it in her post, ‘You don’t have to be anti-Palestinian to support Israel right now. You can support Palestinians and their right to live in their own country.'”
The fear of getting negative comments is understandable but Nattiv said many of those are coming from bots or trolls. “I’m getting a lot of troll comments and all of them are coming from one or two trolls. Those people just sit in a room all day and keep posting. I keep deleting them constantly. One click and suddenly all those fake comments disappear.”
Nattiv mentioned that many of his industry friends have sent supportive text messages, while others have written posts. “Some haven’t yet but I don’t want to pressure them. Everybody I had ever worked with, called or sent a text saying: “We are with you.”
The battle for public opinion escalated on October 12th when the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office decided to release some gruesome photos of murdered babies to the media. Until then, Nattiv had been receiving horrifying images of mutilated bodies, beheaded babies and soldiers, and burned bodies beyond recognition on a daily basis. These images kept him up at night, prompting him to start taking sleeping pills in order to have a good night sleep.
Nattiv stressed the severity of the current situation, saying, “What happened now in Israel is 10 times worse than the Yom Kippur war. This was an attack by a cruel enemy who murdered children, women, and men in cold blood in their beds. They took captive babies, mothers, and older people. They attacked prosperous and peace-loving villages of farmers and looted their homes. They massacred children who were celebrating a nature party and called their crimes a victory.”
Nattiv’s wife, actress-filmmaker Jaime Ray Newman, is also contributing to the cause by handling PR — unofficially — for the state of Israel. The couple has two daughters, Alma, 5, and Mila, 4. When Nattiv saw the photo of Tamar and Johnny Kedem Siman Tov and their three children — six-year-old twins Shahar and Arbel and 4-year-old son Omer — it hit very close to home. On his Instagram page, he wrote: ‘No words. Hamas is butchering and killing our children women and men. This is our reality’.
“I couldn’t imagine that the failure of Yom Kippur could repeat itself. But that failure is a small child compared to what is happening now.”
“I couldn’t imagine that the failure of Yom Kippur could repeat itself. But that failure is a small child compared to what is happening now. What is happening now is our 9/11.
