Israel’s US ambassador called home over interview remarks

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM: Israel’s ambassador to Washington is being summoned home on the instructions of a government disciplinary body to discuss comments he made in a podcast interview, the foreign ministry said Sunday.

Ambassador Yechiel Leiter had made an appearance on a podcast run by the right-wing US online media platform PragerU, in which he accused opponents of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of levelling “blood libels” at the Israeli leader.

“The Director General of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Eden Bar-Tal, will summon the ambassador in Washington, Dr Yechiel Leiter, for a hearing regarding statements he made during a media interview,” a ministry spokesman said in a statement.

The spokesman said the summons was “in accordance with the instructions of the Discipline Department at the Civil Service Commission”.

Although the role of Israeli ambassador to the United States is a political appointment and Leiter was selected by Netanyahu, Israeli diplomats are typically expected to refrain from making political statements.

In the interview with PragerU, Leiter accused “extremists on the left” and the Israeli media of trying to topple Netanyahu’s government.

“It’s the extremists, and there is nothing they won’t do to bring Netanyahu down, and it’s a calumny that needs to be called out,” he said, accusing Netanyahu’s detractors of levelling “blood libels against your own PM”.

Leiter also dismissed as “insanity” claims that the premier was prolonging the war in Gaza to remain in power, adding: “How dare they say something as malicious as that?”

A poll published by Israel’s Channel 12 News on Saturday showed that 55 percent of the public believes Netanyahu is more interested in remaining in power than ending the war or freeing the hostages still held in Gaza.

A former adviser to Netanyahu, Leiter is originally from the United States and lived in a settlement in the occupied West Bank.

His son, Moshe Leiter, was killed in combat in November 2023 in the Gaza Strip.