During his visit to Washington last week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was interviewed for an hour by Fox News and radio host Mark Levin. The interview was a rebuke to the pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel slant so many in the media convey to the public.
Asked about Iran and its proxies, Netanyahu said: “A regime that chants ‘Death to America,’ that’s killed and injured thousands of Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan through their IEDs … that bombed your embassy, that burned your flag, that tried to assassinate President Trump, twice, by the way, tried to assassinate me once, and they just put a price on our head … this is ridiculous. These are the enemies (of) America, sworn to your destruction. And, of course, President Trump understands that. He understands that our enemy is your enemy, and that our victory is your victory. But he went further than that. He changed American policy. He said, if this is our common enemy, we can have a common victory.”
About Iran following the bombing of its nuclear facilities: “This regime is in deep trouble. I mean the Middle East without Iran, the Middle East with Israel and our Arab partners, the possibilities for economic cooperation, technological cooperation, energy cooperation, A.I., tourism, trade … it’s a different world.”
As much of the American and especially European media quickly pivoted from sympathy and support of Israel following the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas, to its previous hostility toward the prime minister and the Jewish state, Netanyahu debunked reporting that relies on Palestinian press releases which blame Israel for killing civilians in Gaza: “Israel does everything in its power to avoid civilian casualties. Hamas does everything in its power to have civilian casualties, civilian casualties on our side when they rocket our cities and civilian casualties on their side when they prevent the civilian population, the Palestinian population, from leaving the combat zones.
So we send millions of text messages, phone calls, leaflets, get out of the war zone because we don’t want you to be hurt. Hamas shoots them. … They shoot their own people, in order to have Western media cover this and say, what are the Israelis doing? And this is horrible.”
Asked by Levin to comment on biased media coverage, Netanyahu responded: “I think that’s the other front. We have a seven-front war, and we’ve won on all fronts and winning on all fronts, but this is the eighth front, the disinformation campaign is among us …. it takes a second for a lie to circulate the world, and then you have to battle it with the only weapon you have, which is the truth and truth is slower than lies and more difficult to ascertain, because you have to get the facts …When you lie, you can say anything, and it’s instantaneous. When you tell the truth, you have to ascertain the facts and until you do that in the electronic age, boy, that lie could encircle the Earth … a thousand times. So it’s a handicap, but we’ll fight the information war, too … I think we have to shame the media that does this.”
Does the prime minister think the apparent success of the bombing mission by Israel and the U.S. against Iran’s nuclear sites will ease antisemitism in Europe and the U.S.: “In a way, yes, because antisemitism targets the Jews, because they’re prominent, but (the stereotype is we are) weak. Well, we’re not weak, and the world has been habituated to the Jews as a victim, perfect victim. During our centuries of wandering, we were massacred, pogromed, expelled and exiled and finally burned in the ovens of Auschwitz … the world got used to us as a perfect victim. Now, they have to get used to us as an equal among the nations, and we will not be slaughtered again.”
Truth has a power of its own, and Netanyahu delivered it powerfully in that interview.
Readers may email Cal Thomas at [email protected].
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