Netanyahu: Israel Fighting ‘Eighth Front’ Battle for Truth
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday addressed a Newsmax-hosted reception attended by journalists, including from The Media Line. Netanyahu thanked Newsmax for its role in what he called the “eighth front” in Israel’s war — the fight against misinformation. “Seven fronts against Iran and its proxies, the eighth front — the battle for truth,” he said. “There’s only one way to beat the lies, and that’s with the truth. Thank you for standing up with Israel. Thank you for standing up for the truth.”
Netanyahu criticized the notion, referenced by former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, that Hamas leaders suffer from hunger, despite evidence from photos that Hamas terrorists are well-fed. “The only deliberate starvation policy … is the starving of our hostages” by Hamas, contrasting the condition of emaciated captives with their “corpulent … tormentors.”
Netanyahu rejected claims that Israel has a starvation policy toward Gaza’s civilians. He said the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have made unprecedented efforts to separate civilians from combatants, warning residents in battle zones to leave, while Hamas has shot at those trying to flee.
“We have sent millions and millions of text messages, phone calls. This has never happened before in a war,” Netanyahu said of the IDF’s efforts to warn civilians. “The genocidal element is Hamas,” he said, adding that the Iranian axis “openly calls for the annihilation … of Israel” and the death of America.
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He explained that Iran’s ultimate plan to destroy America “begins with their attempt to destroy Israel, because we stand in their way. We’re the only force in the Middle East that fights Iran. And until recently, we were the only force in the world that fought Iran.” The prime minister expressed thanks to the Trump administration for sending B-2s to attack Iran’s nuclear sites in June.
Since the second day of the war, he said, Israel has sent nearly 2 million tons of food and medical aid into Gaza. “If we had a starvation policy … everybody in Gaza would be dead,” he said. Netanyahu accused Hamas of looting and obstructing aid, forcing temporary shortages, and said Israel is now in a “humanitarian surge” with more secure distribution points, airdrops, and hundreds of daily truck deliveries.
The prime minister accused Hamas and its supporters of spreading lies through manipulated images, pointing to media photos of three emaciated children he said suffered from genetic diseases, not hunger, and noting that two were treated in Israeli or foreign hospitals. He compared such propaganda to antisemitic blood libels of the Middle Ages, which he said fueled massacres and led to the Holocaust. “Then we had no defense. Now we have a country … an army … and we fight back.”
Netanyahu said Hamas and the Iranian terror axis are “barbarians at the gate,” citing atrocities committed during the Oct. 7 invasion, including murders, rapes, mutilations and beheadings. He made the connection between Oct. 7 and the outrages committed against the Druze in Syria, citing one case in which the attackers “tear out [a victim’s] heart and then eat it” while the person was still alive.
He condemned pro-Hamas activism on US campuses and the slogan “from the river to the sea,” which he said calls for wiping Israel off the map. Such forces, he warned, also target America, chanting “Death to America, death to Israel.”
Declaring Israel’s struggle as a fight “on behalf of Western civilization,” Netanyahu urged allies to resist “the mutilation of the truth” and stand together. “If you do not fight for your civilization, you will lose it,” he said. “We are prepared to fight. And I know America is prepared to stand with us.”
