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Israeli Ambassador to Azerbaijan: For us, every human loss is a tragedy - EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW

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Baku, October 19, AZERTAC

On October 18, Israeli Ambassador to Azerbaijan George Deek gave an exclusive interview to AZERTAC.

AZERTAC presents the interview.

- Mr. Ambassador, in your opinion, what are the reasons behind the attack of Hamas on Israel?

- On October 7th, Hamas invaded our country, they murdered our people. They burned people alive. They massacred families in their bedroom. They raped our girls and they came in, killed our babies and kidnapped elderly and even children and babies away from their parents. I can show you here a few pictures. This family was alive and well. A happy family of mother, father, and three beautiful young teenagers. Today they are all in coffins. I can show you this baby who is no longer with us. Imagine if this was your son, or your daughter's bedroom. Imagine having to worry about him getting up alive in his own bedroom. No people, no family, no child should go through this. People are in shock. They're asking why did Hamas do it? What is the reason? But I don't understand why people are shocked. Because Hamas has said repeatedly every day of every week of every month of the last three decades that their goal is to kill every Jew and every Israeli. That is their aim, to destroy the State of Israel and to commit genocide against Jews. The reason why they did this now is simply because they could. They found an opportunity when we were unprepared.

It was the Sukkot holiday. It was on Shabbat, Saturday, the day of rest. Most of our soldiers were home celebrating the holiday with their families. And then they simply stormed the border and they ran over the fence and stormed over 20 villages in Israel where people were sleeping in their bedrooms in their homes, and committed the massacre they have committed. For that reason, today we are at war. This war is not about politics. It's not about territory. It's not about any of these.

This is a war against evil. When President Biden met with Prime Minister Netanyahu, he said that what the Hamas has done makes even ISIS look reasonable next to them. So this is what we're up against. And our aim is simple, to defeat Hamas and to release our hostages, and to end its rule over Gaza. These are our aims. Right now, we have 200 people held hostage among them even Holocaust survivors in Gaza. No humane organization, no rational human being or organization would do anything like this. And we will stop at nothing until we defeat that terrorist organization.

- Mr. Ambassador, as you mentioned, U.S. President Joe Biden also paid a visit to Israel. We would like to know your opinion about the international community's support for Israel and their attitude to this war.

- First of all, this war was not launched against Israel alone. It was a war that was launched against the international community. I can tell you that more than 41 countries have citizens that were either murdered or kidnapped by Hamas. I have a list of countries that have citizens who were murdered or kidnapped. You can see their names and flags. And I will show you that among them we have here Azerbaijanis. The three Azerbaijanis were murdered by Hamas and one Azerbaijani is missing, perhaps kidnapped right now in Gaza. So, this is not only the war of Israel. This is an international war against terrorism, against ISIS and its likes. And therefore, we must stand together to fight terrorism. Leaders from all over the world have condemned the unimaginable atrocities of Hamas and supported Israel's right to defend itself. And I can tell you even here in Azerbaijan, the love and support and the condolences that we have received from people here who came to lay flowers outside our embassy. People were sending messages, phone calls, SMS, what have you, was truly touching and we were touched by the support that we have received here. And I think it's, I found it quite symbolic that exactly three years after I went to Ganja, after Ganja was attacked indiscriminately against citizens over there. And I laid flowers over there on the ruins of Ganja residential areas. Today, Azerbaijani citizens are coming to our embassy to lay flowers outside here. And right now, our expectation from the international community is to follow the basically the footsteps of President Biden, the leaders of the UK, France, Italy, and so many others around the world. To support Israel's right to protect its people and do whatever it takes to defeat the terrorist organization of Hamas. We also expect the international community to call for the immediate, and unconditional release of the hostages. Many of them, as you have seen are citizens of their countries. And we expect the international community to call on Hamas to stop using its people in Gaza as human shields.

We see this all the time that they are putting their headquarters, their operatives in residential areas among innocent civilians, in houses, in schools, even in hospitals, and use those places as launching pads against Israel, putting their civilians at risk of being hit.

- Both sides accuse each other of the hospital that was hit in Gaza last night. It is claimed that the hospital was hit by Israel. What can you say in this regard? In general, by what criteria does Israel determine the targets it will neutralize? The opposite side also made allegations regarding the shooting of other civilian buildings.

- First of all, I want to say that, like everyone else, I've seen the horrific pictures that came out of the Baptist Hospital yesterday in Gazza. I saw the horrific pictures of people killed, and no decent human being can remain indifferent and my heart goes out to the families and to the innocent people who were hit in this incident. This hospital was hit by a rocket misfired by terrorists in Gaza. They knew it, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, they knew this. We even have intercepted a phone call between two Hamas activists who discuss on the phone without knowing that we were listening to them that they were talking and saying that this was a rocket launched by them, by people in Gaza, by terrorists in Gaza. And we have released this conversation the whole conversation, the whole recording to the media. Usually, we don't reveal our methods of listening and tapping into phones of terrorists in Gaza. But we felt the urge. Because the media was outraged about this. And the way they did it is simple. They knew the misfire the rocket that landed on the hospital and caused all the damage. So, immediately when they realized that they blamed Israel to avoid taking the blame for themselves, and to use it as a propaganda tool to make people getting raged against Israel. Our reaction came a few hours afterwards and the reason it took us a few hours is because unlike them, we want to make sure that we are 100% sure of our facts that we know exactly what happened. And after a few hours, our IDF - Israeli Defense forces came out with evidence that was already released to the media showing exactly what happened. In the proximity of the hospital, the PIJ - Palestine Islamic Jihad, one of the terrorist groups working with Hamas in Gaza, launched rockets. And one of those rockets misfired and exploded mid-air and then it fell down and it fell down on the hospital.

Today we have footage that shows exactly how it happened. In fact, the best footage is coming from Al Jazeera, the mouthpiece of Hamas, where you can literally see the rocket go up and then land on the hospital. Now, I can show you here a map.

Only in the last 10 days. All these red dots that you see inside, I repeat, inside the Gaza Strip are places where rockets fired by Hamas and by Islamic Jihad landed inside Gaza Strip on their own people.

Over 406 rockets landed inside Gaza Strip in the last 10 days alone, since October 7. 405 rockets launched by the terrorists landing on their own people in Gaza and we can see here in the graph, the rise of how many rockets per day misfire.

So, we can see that yesterday 12% of the rockets that were launched towards Israel fell inside Gaza Strip. No wonder there are so many red dots. This is the reality. We are dealing with terrorist organizations that have no respect to our lives, but also has no respect to the lives of the innocent people in Gaza. The innocent people in Gaza who are unjustly suffering under the terrorist regime that is using them as human shields and using their lives as a propaganda. For us, every human loss is a tragedy. For them, every human loss is a political tool to bring the masses against Israel and to bring emotional reaction against Israel. And I have a message here for the international media. It was deeply disappointing to see the international media, including BBC, Sky News, CNN and others, immediately publishing it as if Israel attacked the hospital. Today, it is clear for everyone even President Biden announced in the press conference that he recognizes that this was not an Israeli airstrike, but rather a rocket from the terrorists in Gaza. The lesson is, don't believe anyone. Don't believe the Israeli side either. Check everything as journalists. Make sure that the facts are correct. But also, don't believe Hamas. When they say something like this before you check. It cannot be that this automatically gets published as an intentional airstrike by Israel when eventually it is beyond doubt the rocket that was misfired inside Gaza Strip. So, please let us all media and people be careful with our facts, so that people will not be misled by misinformation.

- What's the current humanitarian situation in Gaza? Are there ways to deliver aid there?

- Right now, we are at war with Hamas when the goal is to defeat Hamas and to free Israel from the threat of living under Hamas military capabilities, and to free the people of Gaza, from the tyrannical rule of that terrorist regime. The most humanitarian thing we can do for the people of Gaza is to free them from Hamas. Our main concern on the humanitarian issue is our 200 hostages. Israelis and other nationals as we have said, who are currently held in Gaza as hostages. And we will make sure that we protect our people both in the Israeli side of the border and inside Gaza, who are held as hostages. Our other goal is to make sure that in our war against Hamas we do our utmost to respect international law. The IDF is a professional army that works along international standards and the international laws of armed conflict. And according to those laws, we do everything in our power to minimize the risk caused to civilians. But we are fighting a regime that wants civilians to be hurt because it serves their propaganda and their goals. And we must call on them to stop the use of human shields, which is putting their children, their wives, their families at risk. We have evidence of Hamas even when we, for example, warn people that a strike might take place in some place. They prevent the people from leaving. We want to attack the building because we know there's a terrorist sitting there, or we know there is a storage of weapons there. So, we send them an SMS, we pull down the leaflets from the sky to the people. We call and we tell them please leave the building you're in is going to be attacked. And once they tried to leave, some of them succeed, but some of them even get blocked by Hamas.

This is a satellite image of a convoy that is driving this direction, trying to leave the north of Gaza to go to the south as we have requested. And these are two military Hamas vehicles blocking anyone from being able to leave the area and they call people to stay home and to stay put and if need to become martyrs, Shaheeds or whatever. To be basically sacrificed for their political agenda of Hamas. And that is something the whole world must condemn. This is the biggest humanitarian crisis that we are facing. We want to protect the civilians of Gaza, while Hamas wants to put them at risk.

- How long do you think the hot phase of this conflict will last and what is needed to stop the war?

- This war has one goal. To defeat and eliminate Hamas’s military capabilities, to take out Hamas and its government over Gaza. But I can tell you this: this war can end today. And for that to happen two things need to happen. First, Hamas gives up all its military capabilities and disarms the Gaza Strip. And secondly, it releases all the Israeli hostages that are currently held. It releases children like Kfir, nine months old, was currently held hostage in Gaza. It releases Ariel, four years old, who is currently held hostage by the terrorists in Gaza. It releases the elderly, some of them Holocaust survivors who survived the Nazis just 70-80 years ago, like Margaret Moses, who is also held a hostage in Gaza. Like Kain, who was also held hostage in Gaza. When all our people and all the internationals are held currently in Gaza, including perhaps even an Azerbaijani will be released. And Hamas dismantles itself from its military capabilities and give us its arms. Nobody has to die. Nobody has to fight. It can end today. But if they don't, if they refuse to give up their arms and to release our people who are held there then we will not relent and we will not stop until Hamas is completely and utterly defeated.

I want to say that we are fighting this war so that no Israeli child will ever have to worry about Hamas terrorists coming into their bedroom to kill them. This is our goal.

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