‘You Cannot Tell Me I am Lying’: CNN’s Amanpour and Israeli Prime Minister Bennett Battle Over Settler Violence

Veteran CNN anchor Christiane Amanpour and Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett battled on-air over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and settler violence, resulting in Bennett accusing Amanpour of lying in how she framed her questioning.

“The West Bank has been occupied since 1967, settlers are allowed to be there. It is a minority, I know that, but they are there and they are violent, this minority,” she said adding that “settlers in occupied territories” are “generally deemed illegal by the rest of the world.”

Amanpour continued, as Bennett shook his head, reading a quote from IDF Central Command chief Maj. Gen. Yehuda Fuchs saying he was concerned by “settler terrorism.”

“What you’ve been projecting is blatantly false,” Bennett said, as Amanpour jumped in. “It’s a lie, simply a lie.”

“No, sir, you cannot say that to me,” she hit back. “You cannot tell me I’m lying.”

“Well, you’re misrepresenting the facts… I said a tiny minority, and I object [to] the symmetry that you’re trying to create here,” Bennett replied.

“There’s no symmetry. I’m talking about your own generals,” replied Amanpour in the interview from Wednesday night.

Bennett then went on to explain his objections to Amanpour’s premise:

But who’s getting murdered? We’re seeing Palestinians murder Israelis. We’re not seeing Israelis murdering Palestinians, and that’s why there’s no symmetry here,” he said. “I also object, these are not occupied territories, they’re territories in dispute, and we have claimed to our own place as well as them.

“I get it. No one’s going anywhere,” he added. “We have to figure out how to live together. That’s my job. To provide security for Israelis, dignity for Palestinians. I’m working on that very hard, and we’re succeeding,” Bennett continued, concluding:

The problem is that the Palestinian leadership is totally corrupt, incompetent, so we have to do the job because there’s no one to work with on the other side, and… indeed, we’re adding jobs, better jobs, but at the end of the day, my utmost responsibility is to provide security to the Israeli people.

Watch the full clip above via CNN International

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