MSNBC host Joy Reid attempted to set a rhetorical trap for her guest — an Israeli official — and ended up mired in it herself when she suggested that Israeli forces would employ a different strategy if they were targeting Hamas terrorists in Israel rather than in Gaza.
Reid set up the question to Mark Regev, former Israeli Ambassador to the United Kingdom, asking whether Israel would “drop 2,000-pound bombs” on a hospital inside their own borders to take out a Hamas leader — with the implication being that Israel cared less about collateral damage and the possibility of civilian casualties when the civilians were Palestinians.
Joy Reid proposes a ridiculous hypothetical to an Israeli official asking: If Hamas's top leader in Gaza "was hiding in Israeli territory, hiding in a hospital there…would Israel drop 2,000-pound bombs on that hospital?"
In reality, the IDF used ground forces to take al Shifa. pic.twitter.com/Ed61urkzrk— Nicholas Fondacaro (@NickFondacaro) December 12, 2023
“Let me ask you this question,” Reid began. “If you were to discover, the Israeli military were to discover that Yahya Sinwar, who is the Hamas militant who planned the 10/7 attacks, was actually hiding in Israeli territory, hiding in a hospital there with his militants, with his men — would Israel drop 2,000-pound bombs on that hospital?”
“We probably — if it was inside Israel and we had control of the ground, we’d send in our special forces as we have in the past when you’ve got sort of terrorist situations, and we would eliminate him,” Regev replied.
“And you would not do that in Gaza,” Reid doubled down, again implying that Israeli forces were not taking care to minimize civilian casualties.
“We actually — no, we have. We have sent ground forces into Gaza,” Regev pushed back. “We’re losing soldiers in very difficult firefights between us and the Hamas terrorists. We will reach Sinwar, it’s only a matter of time.”
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Reid quickly moved to accuse Israel of a “violation of the Geneva conventions,” arguing it was a war crime to force captured Hamas terrorists to strip down to their underwear.
Regev pushed back on that as well, telling Reid, “So, can I say that the reason they have been asked to strip, except for their underwear, is because Hamas, of course, has been one of the pioneers of the use of explosive vests. And we have had too much experience with people from Hamas blowing themselves up and in the process, killing Israelis around them. And that we would ask people who have surrendered to strip off temporarily. That is a necessity of difficult combat with a terrorist group that has used this tactic repeatedly in the past. Too many Israelis have died from Hamas terrorists who have exploded themselves with explosive vests.”
Israel Defense Forces did, as Regev said, send special forces operators in on the ground to execute the raid on Gaza’s Shifa Hospital that took place in mid-November.
In addition, multiple sources have confirmed that Israel Defense Forces have repeatedly taken great pains to avoid civilian casualties whenever possible.