A leftist BBC reporter complained during an interview over the weekend with a former spokesperson for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) that Israel did not tell Hamas terrorists that it was coming to get the hostages.
The comment, which was widely slammed on social media, happened with Helena Humphrey interviewed Jonathan Conricus, who is now a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD).
Humphrey’s remarks come after Israel launched a surprise raid at two locations inside Gaza on Saturday that led to four hostages being successfully rescued.
There is no confirmation about the potential number of civilians who may have been killed during the operation as it was later revealed that some alleged “civilians” were actually working with Hamas to hold the hostages in their homes. Hamas, the terrorist group that controls the government in Gaza, has repeatedly lied throughout the war about the number of civilians who have been killed and about incidents that have unfolded, like when a terrorist rocket killed a number of Palestinians.
Humphrey asked if there should “have been a warning to those civilians for them to get out on time?”
Conricus responded: “Of course, we can’t anticipate Israel to be warning ahead of a raid to extract or to save hostages because then what the terrorists would do is to kill the hostages, and that would defeat the purpose.”
“I think the whole civilian issue here really needs to be analyzed impartially and understood,” he said. “The Israeli hostages were held and jailed by Palestinian civilians in a Palestinian civilian area, and as regrettable as any loss of life is, I think that we would have to investigate really who are the people who jailed these Israeli civilians for eight months? Why did they do it? What was the role of the surrounding community and the hundreds if not thousands of Palestinians who for sure were aware of the fact that these Israeli hostages were being held in their midst, and why were they complicit with Hamas?”
WATCH:
A reporter just asked why Israel didn’t forewarn the Palestinian captors that the IDF is going to be reaching the hostages.
Yes, this happened.pic.twitter.com/3xtO0TVgcW
— Marina Medvin 🇺🇸 (@MarinaMedvin) June 9, 2024