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Former Israeli Anti-Semitism envoy Michal Cotler-Wunsh joins Lewis Goodall to discuss the impact of the UK’s pro-Palestine protests. Cotler-Wunsh argues the demonstrations are enabling the continuation of the war in Gaza while Lewis questions whether it might be the fault of Benjamin Netanyahu and the Israeli government.
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Israeli Minister Amichai Chickley inviting far-right activist Tommy Robinson to visit Israel
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praising him as a courageous leader against radical Islam, leading British Jewish organisations
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we should say, including the Board of Deputies and the Jewish Leadership Council, strongly condemning the invitation, labelling Robinson a thug who represents the very worst of Britain
0:20
Well, we're joined now by Michelle Kotler-Wunsch, who's Israel's former special envoy for combating
0:25
anti-Semitism, resigned from her post this week and has clashed with that same minister
0:29
the diaspora affairs minister, Chikli, earlier this year over far-right invites to the country
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Michelle, thanks so much for joining us this morning. To many of us in Britain, this seems an extraordinary turn of events, perhaps less extraordinary to you who's been
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following it closely. Is this part of a pattern? I think it's part of a lack of understanding
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including in Israel, that anti-Semitism has one definition, whether it comes from the extreme
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right, the extreme left, the extreme Islamists, the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance
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definition of anti-Semitism, the result of a very long democratic process that was adopted
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by more than 40 countries, including the UK, across institutions and many of the universities
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in the UK, enables to identify and combat anti-Semitism for precisely what it is, which
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is the predictor of extremism, as I said, no matter where it comes from
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And that is, in fact, in many, many ways what's been the hindrance across spaces and places
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in comprehensively identifying and combating and actually being able to even identify what
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has become the normalized mainstream strain of anti-Semitism that is ravaging democracies around
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the world, including in the UK, including with the murder of two people, Jews, praying on the
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holiest day of the Jewish calendar on Yom Kippur in Manchester, then leading to protests essentially
1:50
in support of their murderers. Well, I think actually, I think the people involved
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we'll be speaking to one of those people in a moment, Michelle, but the people who've been turning up
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to these protests, they would deny vehemently the idea that they are turning up
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in support of that murder. They are saying that they are protesting
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against Israel's actions, which have been called genocidal by the United Nations in Gaza
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Let's be very clear. Genocide has a definition. The fact that the United Nations
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and its agencies and institutions, and I'm going to say the human rights infrastructure
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Yes, Michelle, but just... Let me just finish the sentence. But you accuse those people of supporting that murder
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On what basis do you say that Please allow me to respond Genocide has a definition And in very very many places including the UK those people who think they showing up in support of what is dubbed pro
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if they were pro-Palestinian protests, they would be protesting to free Gaza from Hamas
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a prescribed terror organization for whom human tragedy is the strategy. They're protesting against the thousands of deaths that we've seen, including children in Gaza
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That's what they're protesting against. And you don't get to choose. You don't get to decide what people protest about
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That is the strategy. Look, I came on today to make very clear that those protests are, in fact, enabling the continued war in Gaza, the continued holding..
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So it's the protesters' fault that Netanyahu keeps the war going, is it? Please, don't you finish the sentence
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Please allow me to finish your sentence. The continued holding of 48 human beings abducted on October the 7th
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when more than 1,200 people were burned alive and butchered and raped
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and more than 250 were abducted into that same Gaza. Sorry, Michelle
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Let me just get this straight. Let me just get this straight. ...organisation that uses the children of Gaza and the people of Gaza as human shields
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So let me just get this straight. Let me just get this straight. You're saying that the reason that those poor souls, the hostages, are still being detained
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or one of the reasons is because people turn out week after week on the streets of Britain
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to protest what they see as the inhumane, disproportionate, outrageous response of the Israeli government to civilians in Gaza
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You're saying that it's their fault and it's not Netanyahu's fault who chooses to continue to prosecute this war
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We should blame those people turning up on the streets of Britain, should we? Israel has been embroiled in what is a two-year-long war that began on October the 7th
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launching thousands of rockets not to fight Hamas, but by Hezbollah, by the Houthis, by Iran itself
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the criminal Islamic regime in Iran. So if people in London truly care about human rights, they would be not just protesting to free Gaza from Hamas
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but to free Lebanon from Hezbollah, to free Yemen from the Houthis, to free Iran from the genocidal Islamic Republic
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Instead, what they are doing is actually... So in order to protest about something
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On the state of Israel, a fellow democracy. So Michelle, your view is... It's defending itself from the same genocidal terror and tyranny that endangers the UK
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So your view is that to protest about anything you have to protest about everything Absolutely not and God forbid Right OK Well then no one would ever protest about anything That actually precisely what happening on the streets of London
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What has happened over the last two years is the emboldening of genocidal terror proxies
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of an Islamic criminal regime in Iran. What role do you think the Israeli government might have had in that, Michelle? Anything at all
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You're not letting me finish one sentence, and I doubt that anybody can understand anything we're saying in this way
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Please allow me to finish a sentence so at least your listeners can doubt a little bit of what it is that's happening on the streets
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And I don't doubt the good intent of the majority of the people that are showing up on the streets
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actually believing that what they're fighting for is human rights. But what they are emboldening is the same genocidal terror and tyranny that Churchill warned Chamberlain
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that when given the choice between dishonor and war, when you choose dishonor, you will have war
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We are embroiled and on the front lines of, that is the state of Israel, a war of barbarism on our civilization
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So do you think Israel should welcome Tommy Robinson? It has nothing to do with Tommy Robinson
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And this interview for me has nothing at all to do with what it is that you began with
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Tommy Robinson and many others have to utilize the IRA working definition of anti-Semitism to identify the anti-Semitism in their own backyard, if you will
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If they are actually committed to combating anti-Semitism. That is the test, because as I said, it's interesting how the far or extreme right, the far or extreme left, the far or extreme Islamists intersect at that ever mutating, lethal, viral hate that is anti-Semitism that the IRA definition actually enables to identify all strains of
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One final thing, Michelle. Whether they are the traditional strains or the new strain, modern strain, just the anti-Zionist strain that has systematically and for decades demonized, delegitimized and applied double standards to the state of Israel, the Jew among nations
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One final thing, Michelle. One final thing, Michelle. You say you don't doubt the intentions
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I will just note that you began this interview by alleging that people who are turning up to those protests are celebrating and doing so supporting the heinous events that happened in Manchester
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What is it that you think? in any other context. I'm just repeating what you said
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After the brutal murder of anybody else would actually justify protests that celebrate those murderers
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They didn't celebrate those murders, Michelle. Well, then clearly, just going back on what you yourself just said
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when you said you don't doubt the intentions of many of those people, because once again, you've alleged without any evidence
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as far as I can tell or see, that those people are supporting the murders that we saw in Manchester
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So that's completely outrageous. That's completely outrageous. But I just wanted to ask one final question If you wouldn mind If you wouldn mind before shouting Could you ask me a question No I didn ask you a question I gave the audience a piece of information I just wanted to ask one final question If you wouldn mind if you wouldn mind before shouting Could you ask me a question No I didn ask you a question I gave the audience a piece of information I just wanted to ask you one final question which is you have been quick to assign blame
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for the extremism that we're seeing and indeed for the continuation of the war itself in a way
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that I don't quite follow to the people who have been turning up on the streets of Britain
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week after week in protest as to what's happening in Gaza. What role, if any, do you assign to the Netanyahu government for, A
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continuing that war and for the hostages not being released. And secondly, for the rising
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extremism that we're seeing, because many, many people believe and many, many international
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institutions say that a genocide is being committed in Gaza, that the response has been
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disproportionate. So what blame do you think the Israeli government has in this
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Perhaps you'd be able to follow if you allowed me to finish one coherent thought. And worse
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perhaps your listeners or viewers will be able to follow if you allow me to finish one coherent
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sentence. But what I've tried to make accessible to you is that I'm trying to sound the alarms for
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you in the UK. It is the UK itself and other democracies that have to recognize that it's the
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UN itself that has enabled its own foundational principles. You're not letting me finish a
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sentence again. To be hijacked, redefined, inverted, weaponized, to demonize, delegitimize, and applicable standards to the Jew among nations. But as always with anti-Semitism
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What starts with the Jews never ends with the Jews. And ever mutating lethal hate, as the former chief rabbi of the UK explained very clearly
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is just the most reliable sign of a major threat to humanity, freedom, and the dignity of difference of all
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And maybe it would be good to pay attention to what is actually playing out with Israel on the front lines
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of a raging war of barbarism on our shared civilization, and not be caught up with what you may think that you understand and you know better
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than Israel that's been engaged and fighting, prescribed terror organizations, and their patrons, Qatar
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and their Islamic Republic of Iran that actually does the very same thing
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to the people of Iran that have been betrayed over and over by democracies
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And all that we've seen on the streets is not pro-Palestinian, but anti-West, anti-democracy
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anti-human rights, and anti-Semitic protests. Michelle, Michelle, I'm grateful to you. People will make up their own minds
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as to how much of that they felt was coherent or not, regardless or not of whether I let Michelle finish the sentence there
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I would say, of course, as well, that some people might consider the attacks that we've
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seen on civilians in Gaza and the deaths we've seen in civilians in Gaza hard to reconcile
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with the idea of that being a civilizational struggle. But that is the contest, which is I can I can I can see her still talking
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