If The Bibi Files has it right, Israel’s democracy – like America’s – is at risk because of the proclivities of its political leader. The latest documentary from producer Alex Gibney’s esteemed and prolific Jigsaw Productions proposes that Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu, the 75-year-old former special forces captain who has spent 17 years as its Prime Minister, is at least partially responsible for the troubled circumstances in which the country currently finds itself.
The film offers a strong case concerning the reasons for Netanyahu’s ongoing resistance to any lasting peace deals with Palestine. Yet, despite the significance of its subject matter, it hasn’t been easy to see anywhere in the world.
Dependent on which news sources you rely on, the actual information that it contains is already available. However, there’s a compelling difference between reading words on page outlining why he’s currently on trial for bribery, fraud and corruption and watching actual footage of him attempting to fend off his official accusers.
Explosive in its implications, the film is directed by Emmy-nominated South African Alexis Bloom (Divide and Conquer: The Story of Roger Ailes), who grew up Jewish. Its chief coup is its access to the thousands of hours of police interrogation videos that landed in Gibney’s inbox a couple of years ago and that place Netanyahu and his supporters in the cross hairs.
The footage speaks for itself as Netanyahu responds to the charges. His angry reactions speak eloquently of his sense of entitlement: “You’re asking me delusional questions… This is preposterous and insane… You’re trying to incriminate the Prime Minister on nonsense…” And the cutting between various other testimonies to the police about the extraordinary precision of Netanyahu’s memory and his repeated refrain to his interrogators of “I don’t remember” guides viewers towards an obvious conclusion.
He frequently appears shifty, refusing to give direct answers, as his belief in his invincibility gradually crumbles in the face of seemingly irrefutable evidence of his abuse of power. Seated at his office desk, surrounded by the paraphernalia of his working life – rather than at a police station like the other witnesses – he's clearly conscious of the camera throughout the interviews. He’s both giving a performance for it, akin to the ones he’s shown delivering so forcefully elsewhere in his public life, and uneasy about the possibility that a surprise question or revelation could bring him undone. Which is what happens, repeatedly.
In a telling scene, he’s confronted by documentation proving that he had – via Qatar, because the Israeli banks refused to cooperate – channelled monthly payments of $35 million to Hamas in order to undermine the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank. By way of justification, he turns to a fictional gangster, Al Pacino’s Michael Corleone in The Godfather Part II (1974), for a rationale: “You need to keep your friends close and your enemies closer.”
And while Bloom’s interviewees are hardly impartial regarding what they see as Netanyahu’s betrayals, none seem unreasonable in their criticisms of his policies and leadership style. Among those who appear are respected Israeli investigative journalist and longtime Netanyahu critic, Raviv Drucker (who also produced the film with Gibney and Bloom), former Israeli PM Ehud Olmert (2006 – 2009), Nimrod Novik, who was a chief advisor to PM Shimon Peres, journalist Nir Efetz, once a spin doctor for Netanyahu, and former housekeepers at the Prime Ministerial residence.
It’s not without justification that Novik describes Netanyahu as “the one who fed the beast” and “the architect of chaos”. And, in the context of what’s gone before, Bloom’s key thesis – that Netanyahu’s direction of the unrelenting bombardment of Gaza was primarily designed to shore up his political position and to serve as grounds for the postponement of his trial – is both deeply disturbing and very persuasive. As the 19-year-old, softly spoken Gili Schwartz, a survivor of the horrific 2023 massacre by Hamas militants at the Kibbutz Be’eri, puts it, “A forever war is beneficial to Netanyahu. It makes people feel they always need him.”
It emerges in the film that one of Netanyahu’s most outspoken supporters is his third and current wife, Sara, which elsewhere might appear to be a perfectly understandable case of spousal loyalty. Here, however, she’s cast as a modern-day Lady Macbeth, whispering in his ear, encouraging his excesses and generally keeping him under her thumb. Her astonishing outbursts when pressed politely but purposefully by police interrogators does nothing to discourage such a view. And their elder son, Yair, emerges as a very splintery chip off both their blocks.
The film also establishes that Netanyahu’s pursuit of power has propelled him into unholy alliances with far-right figures in Israeli politics. The backgrounds of two in particular are documented via news footage in the film (both of whom have repeatedly declared their opposition to the peace process in Gaza). One is Bezalel Smotrich, who’s openly committed to ethnic cleansing, is described by Ami Ayalon, ex-director of the Israeli Security Agency, as “a Jewish terrorist”, and is (at least at the time of writing) Finance Minister in Netanyahu’s cabinet. The other is the outspoken extremist, Itama Ben-Gvir, who’d threatened PM Yitzhak Rabin on camera shortly before his assassination and, until his recent resignation in protest against the peace talks, had served as Minister of National Security and was in charge of the Israeli police force (responsible for overseeing the West Bank).
As Gibney told Christiane Amanpour on CNN a few weeks ago (when he could get a word in), production of the film began with the allegations of petty corruption against Netanyahu but ended up dealing with “the huge crime of using the unbelievable carnage in Gaza to solidify his personal position”. However, despite the convincing case it builds about the threat the PM has been posing to Israel’s security and rule of law – or perhaps because of it – there are forces at work that have sought to bury The Bibi Files.
In September last year, when it was to be screened as a work-in-progress at the Toronto International Film Festival, Netanyahu’s lawyers petitioned – unsuccessfully – for an injunction preventing the screening. They’ve since sought a court order to prevent any further showings of the leaked police videos. Given what they and the film reveal, such actions were only to be expected.
More troubling, however, is the fact that, while the film has been programmed at a few festivals (including the Jewish International Festival in Australia) and has been bought for theatrical distribution in several European countries, it’s been banned (apparently for privacy reasons) in Israel and has struggled to find theatrical exhibition outlets elsewhere.
“No mainstream outlet will show the film in the US,” Gibney told Amanpour. And while Madman has bought the Australian distribution rights, the only way to see it here at the moment is via the company’s adventurous streaming arm DocPlay (Click on the link to take yourself through to the film's page.) However, given the controversy swirling around it – and the attempts to silence it – the film seems destined to remain in the public eye. Where it deserves – and needs – to be.
