Israeli Envoy to Jordanian: ‘have You No Decency, Sir?’

Binyamin Netanyahu, Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations, strongly rejected last night charges made earlier by the Jordanian envoy to the world organization comparing Israel’s military rule in the West Bank to the behavior of the Nazis.

Declaring that he spoke not only as the representative of Israel but also as a spokesman for the six million Jews who were slaughtered by the Nazis during the Holocaust, Netanyahu asked the Jordanian Ambassador, Khalid Madadha, “Have you no decency, sir?”

Netanyahu quoted a Russian saying and told the Jordanian diplomat, “Lie but know when to stop.” He said that the Jordanian envoy should have known when to stop speaking lies when he talked about Israel.

Netanyahu used his right of reply in the General Assembly last night to respond to an address by Madadha during the General Assembly’s opening session yesterday of its yearly debate on “The Situation in the Middle East.”

Madadha charged that the sadism Nazis applied to Jews has become “the Israeli sadism applied to Arabs.” He said that the Nazi “ovens have become Israeli ovens” for the Palestinians.

Noting that most of the members of the Israeli delegation to the UN and many members of their families are survivors of the Nazi concentration camps who had been ruthlessly shot, shipped away or horribly experimented on, Netanyahu asked whether the Jordanian diplomat suggests that Israeli policy is similar to these atrocities.

As for the Israeli military rule on the West Bank, the Israeli envoy claimed it is the most benign military occupation in history. He also said that during Jordan’s rule of the West Bank, more Palestinian Arabs had left their land than under Israeli rule. Netanyahu also asked whether Madadha spoke about the Holocaust out of ignorance or arrogance. He said it was the responsibility of all members of the UN that such statements will not be made again.