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Post: After an international outcry… Israeli Finance Minister: My words on the removal of Hawara City were ill-chosen

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Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich admitted on Saturday that he chose his words poorly when he called for the “annihilation” of a Palestinian village following the killing of two Israelis, a statement that sparked an international outcry.

“I may have chosen the wrong word,” Smotrich told Channel 12 TV.

Smotrich made the announcement last week after two young settlers were shot dead as they drove their car near the Palestinian village of Hawara in the occupied northern West Bank, triggering an attack by Israeli settlers on the town.

“I think the city of Havara should be destroyed,” Smotrich said that day. “I think this is what the State of Israel should do,” he added.

He later backtracked and clarified on Twitter that he “doesn’t want to eliminate Hawara but just target the terrorists”.

international condemnation

In a statement, the French Foreign Ministry condemned the statements as “unacceptable, irresponsible and unworthy of attention issued by a member of the Israeli government”.

“These statements only serve to fuel the current spiral of hatred and violence,” the statement said, urging calm.

On Friday, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights condemned the Israeli minister’s “unacceptable” statements.

Speaking at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, Volker Turk called Smotrich’s appeal “an incredible statement of incitement to hatred and violence”.

On Saturday, the foreign ministers of France, Germany, Italy, Poland, the United Kingdom and Spain expressed “serious concern about the continuation and intensity of violence in the occupied Palestinian territories” in a joint statement.

For his part, the spokesman for the US Department of State, Ned Price, said that the government of President Joe Biden condemns these statements, calling them “irresponsible and disgusting” and that they “incite violence”.

The US official added that Washington is asking the Israeli prime minister to publicly condemn what Smotrich said.

Source: EuroNews

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