Police on Monday arrested two Jewish men in their 20s on suspicion of attacking veteran Druze reporter Iyad Harb in the Shimon HaTzadik neighborhood in Jerusalem on Sunday. Harb came to Shimon HaTzadik Sunday night to cover the violence between Arabs and Jews, after covering the flags parade. Those are the facts as reported by several Israeli media outlets. Now watch this video, where Harb is being interviewed on N12 News about the event Monday night:
Harb tells the interviewer: “regarding ben Gvir, he arrived at the place, I told him, listen, I want to tell you something, he tells me, what? So I told him I’m a journalist from the Broadcasting Authority, and I’m an IDF handicapped veteran, son of a bereaved family, your guys attacked me, stole my smartphone, tell them to return the smartphone, I don’t want anything from them, I don’t even want to file a complaint, just let them return the smartphone, I need it for my work, I’m being evacuated to the hospital, I don’t want anything from them. He tells me, I came here because Jews were attacked. I told him, Ah, then you’re not interested in anyone else, you care about Jews and that’s all. This is the face of part of the Knesset members.”
Luckily, a bystander videoed the exchange between Harb and Ben Gvir. Turns out it was longer and during the exchange, Ben Gvir expressed empathy, comforted the agitated journalist, and promised to do what he could to retrieve his phone. He also insisted that the attackers were not his people and that he had been “over there,” in a different part of the neighborhood, and said, towards the end, that the reason for his being there was because Jews had been attacked there.
Ben Gvir can be heard saying to Harb: “It’s awful and horrible in my view. I’ll try to help you. I’ll check it out, I’m sure you’re not to blame. I don’t know you, but it’s awful in my opinion what they did to you. I’ll check it out now.”
Take a look at Ben Gvir’s body language and decide for yourself if he comes across as the monster Harb described:
MK Ben Gvir sent an urgent warning to the journalist, demanding compensation of one million shekels and an apology. According to Ben Gvir: “This is a blood libel. I told him over and over that I appreciated him, that the assault on him was a horrible act and that I would look into how he could be helped, and to get back the phone that was taken from him. It’s a shame that for the sake of ratings, the journalist chose to attack me, and he must apologize and pay for his slander.”
Every day I like Itamar Ben Gvir more. He’ll make a great Internal Security Minister someday.
