Friedman called on the Israelis to overthrow Netanyahu’s government (French)
American journalist and writer Thomas Friedman said that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will go down in history as the worst leader in Jewish history.
He said in an interview with the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, "I will be honest, I think this is the worst government that Israel has ever seen. I believe that Netanyahu will go down in history as the worst leader in Jewish history, and not just in Israeli history."
He added, "I will not allow this Israeli government to be waiters at my grandson's coming-of-age party. They are truly incompetent," referring to the failure of the Netanyahu government to manage the war on Gaza.
Friedman criticized the government's refusal to make any kind of plan for the morning after the war.
He considered that if Israel entered into a partnership with the Palestinian Authority to form two states for two peoples, it could solve 3 of its current problems: changing the narrative, changing Gaza’s options, and strengthening the regional alliance with its Arab allies.
Friedman, a writer for the American newspaper The New York Times, described the Israeli war on Gaza as the real World War II. He said, “When the Ukraine war broke out, I said: This is actually World War I.”
The war we call "World War I" was not a world war.
Friedman added, explaining that the Ukraine war was World War I because people could follow it on their smartphones, and they could express their opinions about it, and the agricultural impact was immediate, there was an impact on food prices, and it was a real world war.
He continued, "I claim that Israel's war on Gaza is in fact World War II. Everyone in the world has an opinion about it, follows it, and is affected by it. It affects classrooms everywhere."
Two pieces of advice for Americans and Israelis
Friedman rejected that Israel's crimes in Gaza were genocide.
"I find that horrific, I think that's wrong. I don't think this is genocide. But I think it's a terrible war in which a very large number of civilians were killed, but I don't think it was intentional," he said.
He believed that the case of South Africa against Israel in the International Court of Justice is a clear indication that Israel launched a war without any kind of political vision or strategic plans for the future, thus exposing itself to accusations that it is committing genocide.
Friedman concluded the interview with two stark warnings:
The first is for the Americans: Do not re-elect (former US President Donald) Trump, and the second is for the Israelis: Vote to oust Netanyahu and his coalition government.
“I believe that if Netanyahu survives this war and Trump is re-elected, the world that I want to leave to my new grandchildren will no longer exist,” Friedman said.
The ongoing Israeli war on Gaza left tens of thousands of martyrs and wounded, most of them children and women, massive destruction and an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe, which led to Israel appearing for the first time since its establishment in 1948, before the International Court of Justice on charges of committing “genocide.”
Source: Israeli press + Anadolu Agency