US Ambassador to Israel Slammed for Drawing Moral Equivalence Between Deaths in Military Operation, Terrorist Attack
Tensions between Israel and Palestine are escalating after a deadly terror attack near the Eli settlement that left four Israelis dead, and a military operation in Jenin that caused Palestinian casualties. US Ambassador to Israel, Tom Nides, expressed condolences for both incidents, causing criticism from his Israeli counterpart, Mike Herzog.
Nides condemned the civilian deaths on both sides, drawing criticism from Herzog, who deemed such balanced condemnation disrespectful to the Israeli victims.
“Today, yet another heinous Palestinian terror attack claimed the lives of 4 innocent Israeli civilians. There is no justification whatsoever for the targeting and killing of innocent civilians. It must be unequivocally condemned,” Herzog wrote on Twitter. “Any attempt of a so called ‘balanced’ condemnation is misguided and disrespectful to the memory of the victims.”
Abe Foxman, former head of the Anti-Defamation League, responded to Nides in a tweet that said, “Unfortunate statement from Israel’s best friend and ally. It borders on moral equivalency!”
Nides later issued a separate tweet condemning the Eli terror attack, while Herzog noted the escalating terror activities in the northern West Bank.
German Ambassador Steffen Seibert expressed his dismay at the news, and Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen called for worldwide condemnations of the attack. Meanwhile, the United Nations special coordinator for the Middle East peace process, Tor Wennesland, called for restraint, only to face criticism from Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Gilad Erdan.
