In a Sunday appearance on CBS’s Face the Nation, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called out The Associated Press for lying about the Saturday bombing of the building they willing shared with Hamas terrorists. He also schooled CBS fill-in moderator John Dickerson by noting the extra measures Israel took to reduce the number of civilian casualties in the areas they were targeting.
During the course of their interview, Dickerson seemed to scoff at the idea that Israel had proof that Hamas was using the media as human shields. Asking: “It’s inconceivable you would have talked to [President Biden] and not shared proof of Hamas in those buildings that housed the journalists. Did you share that with him?” Dickerson seemed uninterested in why Biden had not condemned the bombing.
Netanyahu noted that they passed the information along through the proper intelligence channels and then went after the AP for their lies suggesting they had only just escaped the building before it collapsed:
The interesting thing is I would say all of the journalists – one of the, I think, AP journalists said ‘we were lucky to get out.’ No, you weren't lucky to get out. It wasn't luck. It’s because we took special pains to call people in those buildings, to make sure that the premises were vacated. And that’s why we brought down that building.
Many have pointed out that there was no way that the AP didn’t know Hamas was using the same building as them; they would be very poor journalists otherwise or lying. In 2014, former AP writer Matti Friedman described how Hamas would launch rockets right outside the AP office building and Hamas fighters would raid their bureau to threaten them, and the outlet wouldn’t report it to their readers.
Further, Dickerson wanted to see the “smoking gun” proof that The Jerusalem Post had reported was shown to the United States. “And here’s the intelligence we had: It’s about Palestinian terrorists, an intelligence office for the Palestinian terrorist organization housed in that building that plots and organizes the terror attacks against Israeli civilians. So, it is a perfectly legitimate target,” the Prime Minister said.
Netanyahu went on to school Dickerson on the “special precautions” Israel took to protect lives while Hamas “deliberately” targeted civilians and glorified the deaths of all civilians (Click “expand”):
Now, imagine – Ask yourself, how is that possible? You see the high-rise towers that are used by Hamas, over and over again, they collapsed, and no one is killed. Why does that happen? Because we, unlike Hamas, take special precautions to tell people to leave the building, leave the premises, and we make sure everyone is gone before we bring down those terrorist facilities.
And that's the difference between Israel and Hamas. They deliberately target our cities. Deliberately target our civilians. They’re glorifying the death of children and civilians and old people. They’re happy with it. I think they’re happy with any deaths that are caused to them. We grieve for every non-combatant loss in Gaza, and we grieve for all our civilians who die. We're not happy with it and we try to minimize it.
The interview started contentiously as Dickerson suggested the timescale of the conflict was entirely dependent on Israeli military action. “I want to start with yesterday was the worst clash in this seven-day conflict. The last one of a similar sort was in 2014 lasted six weeks. How much longer are these hostilities going to continue,” he demanded to know.
“Well, we hope that it doesn't continue very long,” the Prime Minister explained. “We're trying to degrade Hamas' terrorist abilities and to degrade their will to do this again. So, it’ll take some time. I hope it won't take long, but it is not immediate.”
And as they were nearing the end of the interview, Netanyahu told Dickerson off by asking: “What would you do if it happened in Washington or to New York? You know damn well what you’d do. You do, at the very least, what we’re doing.”
The transcript is below, click "expand" to read:
CBS’s Face the Nation
May 16, 2021
10:39:37 a.m. EasternJOHN DICKERSON: I want to start with yesterday was the worst clash in this seven-day conflict. The last one of a similar sort was in 2014 lasted six weeks. How much longer are these hostilities going to continue?
PM BENJAMIN NETANYAHU: Well, we hope that it doesn't continue very long. But we were attacked by Hamas on our national day, Jerusalem day, we were attacked – unprovoked attacks on Jerusalem, and then thousands of rockets and missiles on our cities. And I think any country has to defend itself, and has a natural right of self-defense, will do whatever it takes to restore order and quiet and the security of our people. And deterrence. We're trying to degrade Hamas' terrorist abilities and to degrade their will to do this again. So, it’ll take some time. I hope it won't take long, but it is not immediate.
(…)
10:40:23 a.m. Eastern
DICKERSON: The procisioning of that targeting has been up for question. There has been a lot of focus on the bombing on Saturday in Gaza, the building that housed The Associated Press and Al-Jazeera. Te Committee to Protect Journalists demanded “detailed and documentation of justification.” This morning there’s a Jerusalem Post story that says that the Americans were shown a “smoking gun,” that proof that Hamas was in that building. What is that proof, and did you show it to the Americans?
NETANYAHU: Well, we share with our American friends all that intelligence. And here’s the intelligence we had: It’s about Palestinian terrorists, an intelligence office for the Palestinian terrorist organization housed in that building that plots and organizes the terror attacks against Israeli civilians. So, it is a perfectly legitimate target.
And I can tell you that we took every precaution to make sure that there were no civilian injuries. In fact, no deaths, no injuries whatsoever – well, I can't say injuries, I don't know if somebody received a fragment of a stone, I don’t know that – but no people were killed.
Now, imagine – Ask yourself, how is that possible? You see the high-rise towers that are used by Hamas, over and over again, they collapsed, and no one is killed. Why does that happen? Because we, unlike Hamas, take special precautions to tell people to leave the building, leave the premises, and we make sure everyone is gone before we bring down those terrorist facilities.
And that's the difference between Israel and Hamas. They deliberately target our cities. Deliberately target our civilians. They’re glorifying the death of children and civilians and old people. They’re happy with it. I think they’re happy with any deaths that are caused to them. We grieve for every non-combatant loss in Gaza, and we grieve for all our civilians who die. We're not happy with it and we try to minimize it.
DICKERSON: I want to get to minimizing casualties, but you spoke with President Biden yesterday. It’s inconceivable you would have talked to him and not shared proof of Hamas in those buildings that housed the journalists. Did you share that with him?
NETANYAHU: Well, we passed it through the intelligence services to our people to those people. Why do you think we brought down that building?
The interesting thing is I would say all of the journalists – one of the, I think, AP journalists said ‘we were lucky to get out.’ No, you weren't lucky to get out. It wasn't luck. It’s because we took special pains to call people in those buildings, to make sure that the premises were vacated. And that’s why we brought down that building.
And look, you have your own experiences, I think in Mosul, in Fallujah, in Afghanistan. I think you can appreciate the efforts we go through in dense urban fighting, when terrorists are targeting civilians, who are hiding behind civilians, how difficult that is. We do our best to avoid civilian casualties. And we did that yesterday with that building as well.
DICKERSON: Mr. Prime Minister, the arguments about how careful Israel has been are familiar ones to your critics. And in this case, with 181 Palestinians dead, 52 of them children, there’s significant criticism. Amnesty International has asked the International Criminal Court to look into a refugee camp attack. The U.N. is meeting today, foreign ministers of the E.U. are meeting, and the response has been like this one from the foreign minister of Ireland: "Israel has international legal obligation to protect children in conflict and are not doing so."
NETANYAHU: That's just false. I mean, the reason we have these casualties is because Hamas is criminally attacking us from civilian neighborhoods, from schools, from homes, from office buildings. That's what they're doing.
DICERSON (interrupting): But –
NETANYAHU: And we're taking action, trying to target them with as great precision as we can. Unfortunately, there are occasionally civilian casualties, which we regret.
But here’s what happens, when the international community attacks Israel, they're actually encouraging Hamas to continue these attacks. Because Hamas says, “It’s great, we're both killing Israeli civilians, and unfortunately some of ours --” And they're happy with their own civilian casualties because it gets that international community to focus their attacks on Israel instead of Hamas. That's wrong.
It’s both wrong and unproductive. Because actually, what it does is prolong the conflict and escalate and increase the number of casualties that happen as a result of the continuation of the conflict.
(…)
10:46:20 a.m. Eastern
NETANYAHU: What would you do if it happened in Washington or to New York? You know damn well what you’d do. You do, at the very least, what we’re doing.
(…)
