Anchor Cuts Off Israeli Spokesman During Heated Interview: ‘If You Can’t Answer the Question, Then I Can’t Allow You To Do the Propaganda Bit’
Channel 4 News anchor Krishnan Guru-Murthy cut off Israeli government spokesman David Mencer on Tuesday after accusing him of reciting “propaganda” instead of answering questions.
“First of all, is the Israeli government apologizing to the families of the aid workers killed, including the three families in Britain?” asked Guru-Murthy straight out of the gate, in reference to the seven World Central Kitchen (WCK) aid workers killed by an Israeli airstrike on Monday.
Mencer replied, “From the prime minister to the defense minister to the spokesman for the Israel Defense Forces, all of us have expressed grief about this occurrence.”
“Yes, but are you apologizing?” the anchor pressed.
Mencer snapped, “To be frank, if you’ll let me answer, Krishnan, there’s no point attacking me already, I’ve just arrived.”
“I’m not attacking you, I’m just asking you a simple question. I want an answer to it. Are you apologizing?” Guru-Murthy questioned, to which Mencer replied, “Allow me to answer. We have expressed grief about this operation, but we need to find out exactly what has happened.”
Seemingly mistaking the name of the WCK for the UK vodka brand WKD, Mencer continued, “There is a sense of grief across the whole country because WKD are one of the good guys.”
Guru-Murthy shot back, “But you’ve said this was unintentional. So this was a mistake, wasn’t it? So you can apologize already. You don’t need to know the precise details to issue an apology. There are grieving families tonight.”
“There are grieving families and we grieve with them,” declared Mencer, to which Guru-Murthy responded, “Well you killed them.”
After Mencer said the provision of aid “to innocent Gazans” was “sacrosanct” to the Israeli government, Guru-Murthy said:
I mean, it’s not sacrosanct. Your saying things like you’re trying to get as much aid as possible is just not true because only a few days ago, the UN’s highest court, the ICJ, ordered Israel to without delay facilitate humanitarian aid, and tonight a ship laden with tons of aid is sailing away and humanitarian organizations are saying it is simply too dangerous for them to carry on supplying aid because you kill their aid workers. So it is just not true to say it’s sacrosanct.
Towards the end of the interview, Guru-Murthy asked Mencer, “Can I ask you as a matter of fact, did Israel bomb the Iranian consulate in Syria?”
After Mencer said he had “no comment on that” other that to claim that the consulate “wasn’t a civilian embassy, it was a military base for al-Quds,” Guru-Murthy concluded, “I’m sorry, David, I’ve got to cut you off there. I’m just trying to get answers to questions, and if you can’t answer the question, then I can’t allow you to do the propaganda bit afterwards.”
Watch above via Channel 4.
