September 06, 2024
By Nasser Kandil
- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has intensified his media appearances to the point where he holds daily press conferences. On days without a conference, he appears on television interviews, often on pro-Netanyahu outlets like Fox News, which supports him and his wars unconditionally. In all these appearances, driven by his awareness that he is losing public support within the occupying entity, Netanyahu repeats the same line: “The people are with me”.
- However, Israel’s official broadcasting authority recently conducted a poll, asking whether people support Netanyahu’s insistence on staying in the Philadelphi Corridor instead of negotiating a deal. Only 30% agreed with him, while 53% opposed his stance. Yet, Netanyahu still declares, “The people are with me”.
- In another poll about his handling of the war, 63% of respondents expressed dissatisfaction. Nevertheless, Netanyahu continues to claim that “the people are with me”.
- Meanwhile, the streets of Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Haifa, and other cities are filled with hundreds of thousands of protesters, according to unanimous reports from Hebrew TV channels. The demonstrators demand Netanyahu’s resignation, yet he persists in saying, “The people are with me”.
- In an interview with Fox News, when asked about the protests, Netanyahu acknowledges the people’s right to demonstrate but reiterates, “The people are with me”.
- Netanyahu knows he has lost the support of the majority, who initially followed him at the start of the war, hoping for a decisive victory. He is fully aware that defeat is at hand but chooses denial. He is now pressuring these so-called “people” – those he claims are still with him – under the weight of failures: the inability to return hostages, eradicate the resistance, resettle displaced settlers before the school year, or reopen the Red Sea trade route to and from the occupying entity. He has no roadmap to offer for achieving any of these objectives, which is why the people are abandoning him for good. Still, Netanyahu insists, “The people are with me”.
- This is far from Netanyahu’s first lie; he has a habit of deception. He once stood before the U.S. Congress and described October 7 – a day the “people” he claims to represent view as a black day in the entity’s history – as a day of military heroism. The military he praises is the same one that was caught off guard, its bases and positions swiftly overrun by the resistance.
- Netanyahu even claims that not a single civilian was killed in the battles of Rafah, yet the world witnessed the massacre of displaced civilians, many of whom were women and children, burned alive in their tents.
- Netanyahu’s web of lies may seem long, but no matter how long it stretches, it will always remain short.
