‘Foreign diplomats aren’t infallible’ – Netanyahu hits back at US attack on Smotrich

In Hebrew-language tweet, Netanyahu snipes at U.S. ambassador who excoriated right-wing minister and said he would “throw him off the plane” to the U.S. if he could.

By Adina Katz, World Israel News

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich in a Twitter statement on Saturday evening for explaining that his comments urging the government to “wipe out” Huwara were not a call for the harming of innocents or collective punishment.

But Netanyahu also seemed to be miffed by alleged remarks from U.S. Ambassador Tom Nides, who reportedly was incensed by Smotrich’s comments. According to Hebrew language media reports, Nides said that Smotrich was a “fool” and that he wanted to “throw him off the plane” during his upcoming flight to the U.S.

“It is important that Finance Minister Smotrich clarified that he had no intention of harming the innocent or [supporting] collective punishment,” Netanyahu wrote on Twitter late Saturday evening. “I know his positions and they were reflected in his clarification.”

Notably, Netanyahu appeared to snipe at Nides in the latter part of the Hebrew-language tweet.

“None of us are infallible [from making incendiary statements], including foreign diplomats,” he wrote, apparently in reference to Nides’ statements regarding Smotrich.

That sentiment was absent in Netanyahu’s English language tweets on the matter, in which he wrote that “it is important for all of us to work to tone down the rhetoric” and “lower the temperature.”

Netanyahu said that “includes speaking out forcefully against inappropriate statements and even correcting our own statements when we misspeak or when our words are taken out of context.”

The prime minister thanked Smotrich for publicly stating that he did not call to harm innocent civilians in Huwara.

“While Minister Smootrich [sic] clarified his position, I am still waiting to hear a condemnation from the Palestinian Authority for the murder of the Yaniv brothers,” Netanyahu continued.

“And Israel is waiting for the international community to insist that the PA condemn that attack. Not only has it not done so, it continues to turn a blind eye to the PA’s rampant incitement, to the disgusting spectacle of Palestinians handing out sweets to celebrate terror attacks against Jews and to the official PA pay-to-slay policy, in which the PA pays terrorists to murder Jews.”