Full interview: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu

[0:00] Mr. Prime Minister, thank you very much. [0:03] Everything we just saw is possible because of this extraordinary peace plan, this ceasefire and deal. [0:10] At the Knesset a day ago now, President Trump thanked Steve Witkoff and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, for helping bring it together. [0:19] How did, essentially, three real estate guys change the game in this region more than decades of State Department experts? [0:30] Well, first of all, they did a great job, and I welcome the opportunity to work with Jared and Steve and Ron Durma on our side. [0:37] But it was a combination of two things, a combination of military pressure and diplomatic savvy, diplomatic pressure. [0:45] Diplomatic pressure doesn't work without the military. It never works. [0:50] So, the IDF is closing in on Gaza City. [0:53] Well, we had a big debate on that. We had a debate, and I said, you know, because we got through a combination of diplomatic, military pressure and diplomatic pressure. [1:02] We got 200, more than 200 hostages out back, 147 of them alive. [1:09] But we still had those who are left. We had 20 live ones that were left and 28 that we're still trying to get back. [1:18] And it was said, you're not going to get the live ones out. You're just not going to get them, the last ones, because Hamas will never give them up. [1:26] That's their security belt. And I said, no, I think we will. [1:30] But we need two things. One, we need to put, really, the knife to their throats by going into Gaza City. [1:38] There was a big debate about that. And I said, it's going to work. [1:41] But I also have to have my friend, Donald Trump, because I want him to put the diplomatic pressure [1:48] and to fashion a deal which our teams worked on for quite some time, which would first get that out of the way. [1:57] That is, not succumb to Hamas's conditions, dictates. [2:02] So I said, yeah, I'll give you the 20, leave Gaza altogether, no disarmament, no demilitarization. [2:09] And we had to get them to say, no, we're going to give you the 20. [2:12] And the IDF, Israeli army, stays in Gaza, and we fashion a plan that will ultimately disarm them and demilitarize them. [2:20] I believe that was possible. President Trump believed that was possible. [2:24] We joined hands. Our teams worked brilliantly. And it worked. [2:28] President Trump says the war is over. But clearly the war is not over. [2:33] The IDF is deployed to sections of Gaza still, and Hamas is still on the streets of Gaza. [2:38] How can you say the war is over? [2:40] Well, we agreed to give peace a chance. We agreed that we should, the conditions in this 20-point plan are very clear. [2:51] It's not only that we get the hostages out without getting our military out, but that we would subsequently have both demilitarization and disarmament. [3:01] They're not the same thing. First, Hamas has to give up its arms. [3:04] And second, you want to make sure that there are no weapons factories inside Gaza. [3:08] There's no smuggling of weapons into Gaza. That's demilitarization. [3:12] We agreed that that's part of the plan. And we also agreed, OK, let's get the first part done. [3:18] And now let's give a chance to do the second part peacefully, which is my hope. But if not, I think I heard the president speak tonight. [3:27] He said, listen, they better do it or, you know, how can I speak for him? He said, all hell breaks loose, OK? [3:37] Well, I hope it doesn't. I hope we can do this peacefully. And we're certainly ready to do so. [3:43] As part of the ceasefire, there's a prisoner exchange, including some prisoners convicted of mass murder, terror here in Israel. [3:51] And many will remember that the architect of October 7th was himself formerly a prisoner released in a previous exchange, Yahya Sinwar. [4:01] Are you going to regret this decision? [4:04] Well, I always thought that there was an enormous price to pay for the commitment that Israel has to bring, you know, bring our hostages or captives held by the enemy. [4:16] And it's always, it's very painful. It's painful because there are families who lost their loved ones to some of these murderers who are released. [4:23] It's true that the worst ones among them we didn't release, but that's small comfort. [4:29] You know, if your son or daughter was murdered by one of these people who were freed, that's very painful. [4:34] I don't deny that. But there's a larger question. [4:38] And that is, I think, the ability to get our hostages out and to be in a position that if Hamas doesn't follow the next stages of the deal, [4:49] then we are in a much better position to get it to do it without these 20 young boys that I just saw, some of them, five of them, [4:58] that they're not there with their head on the chopping block. [5:02] You just mentioned how closely you're working with Donald Trump on this. [5:05] He took some digs at you, as he often does with people during his speech at the Knesset. [5:10] Why does he say you're so hard to work with? [5:13] Well, I hope he says that because I'm very tough on the matters that pertain to my country's future. [5:18] Israel is, you know, where the Jewish people are 3,500 years old. [5:21] And we went through the odyssey of time with horrible things. [5:25] I mean, with pogroms and expulsions and mass murder and ultimately the worst mass murder of them all, which is the Holocaust. [5:32] And when we reestablish the Jewish state and the Israel Defense Force, we said never again. [5:44] We're not going to have our head on the chopping block again. [5:47] We will resist this. And we did. [5:49] And I think that sometimes it's the responsibility, not sometimes, it is always the responsibility of the leader of the Jewish state to make sure that the Jewish state is never imperiled with its very existence. [6:05] That's why I did the things I did, including the historic action against Iran that threatened to annihilate us, throw atomic bombs at us. [6:16] So, you know, when I have to, when I believe that what I'm asked to do is fine, I say yes. [6:24] And when I think I have to say no, I say it. [6:27] And that's my job. My job is to protect the Jewish state and assure the future of the Jewish people. [6:34] And that means assuring the future of the state of Israel. [6:37] This next phase of the ceasefire negotiations, the peace plan, everything about the future of Gaza is on the table. [6:45] Right. [6:46] Disarmament, demilitarization, deradicalization, and the government of Gaza. [6:52] I'm confused. Who is going to govern Gaza? [6:57] The only names mentioned are Donald Trump and Tony Blair. [7:00] Is Tony Blair going to be the president of Gaza? [7:03] I doubt it. But I think that this is a transitional period. [7:07] And we want to fashion, you know, a governance that works, that is not made of people who are committed to our destruction. [7:13] Because if we are, if we put them there, then we just repeat it again and again and again. [7:18] And we don't want to have the October 7th massacre repeated. [7:21] But I think the brilliance of this plan is at first it got out the hostages that nobody believed we'd get them out. [7:30] Except perhaps Donald and me. I mean, we really believed it. And I think it worked. [7:36] Our cooperation worked. And the incredible sacrifice and courage of our soldiers on the one side, [7:42] and the brilliance of the negotiating teams on the other side combined, and they did it. [7:46] So, you know, in the next phase, the important thing is to establish the principles. [7:51] And now we create the structures to do it. [7:53] Can I tell you that it's finished, that it's done, that everything is settled? No. [7:58] We're going to go through this now. [8:00] But I think we go at it in a much better, much, much better position. [8:04] Let's try to detail what it means to go at it. [8:06] How do you de-radicalize the population in Gaza that wants to fight? [8:10] You've got thousands of young men who have just spent two years during brutal war or fighting in this brutal war. [8:18] And on the back of that, generations of struggle. How do you possibly de-radicalize that? [8:23] Well, first of all, we've seen de-radicalization not only in Germany. [8:26] You know, they were subject to Hitlerian propaganda, Nazi propaganda. [8:30] You saw it in Japan. I mean, generations that were raised on fanatic propaganda, suicide bombers, really, kamikaze and so on. [8:39] And they were de-radicalized basically through the educational system. [8:42] In this case, it will be the educational system and the mosque. [8:45] But we also see it in the Middle East, certainly in the Gulf states where there's been considerable de-radicalizations. [8:50] So first of all, it's possible. [8:52] But I think that you have to understand that Gaza is not uniform. [8:57] The thing that amazes me is that right now there's an internal battle in Gaza. [9:04] And it's not between Israelis and Palestinians. It's between Palestinians and Palestinians. [9:09] I mean, there are Gazans who are fighting Hamas and are saying, we don't want this anymore. [9:14] You are tyrannizing us. You're executing our people. You don't allow for any dissent. [9:21] And you brought misery and horrific misery on us. And they want to fight them. [9:27] So it's not as if you have this uniform support for Hamas. [9:32] A lot of people in Gaza oppose Hamas. And a lot of people in Gaza now know that Hamas has brought catastrophic consequences to them because of its fanaticism. [9:44] So I think there's a possibility here. There's a fertile ground to begin to change this. [9:50] Will it be easy? No. But I think the most important thing, you know, the most important thing, I'm going to tell you something that people don't understand. [9:57] The most important thing in destroying fanaticism is to destroy a certain hope, the hope that the fanaticism will achieve its results. [10:10] When people know Israel is here to stay, you're not going to destroy the Jewish state. Israel is too strong. [10:15] That prepares the ground for a change of heart. It's not sufficient, but it's a necessary condition that I think has been achieved in this action. [10:25] We have to talk about Sharm el-Sheikh. 20 world leaders gather to sign a declaration of peace and continue the momentum. [10:32] You say you're committed. You were invited. You're not there. Why? [10:37] I wanted to go very much. And I appreciate very much the invitation of President Sisi. [10:41] And also Egypt's help in mediation. The mediators were important. [10:44] I think that we have to give them credit where credit is due. [10:49] Even though I think, again, I think that the sacrifice and courage of our brave soldiers was indispensable. [10:56] Nothing could have happened without it. [10:59] But why not be there? [11:00] Oh, I wanted to be there. The problem was we were, as President Trump said, we had long speeches. [11:06] They were. [11:07] We were all there. But it's not only the speeches. The schedule ran bad. [11:11] And we entered the Jewish holiday. And during the Jewish holiday, the prime minister of the Jewish state does not travel. [11:18] And that's why. But I wanted very much to go there. In fact, I said, could we arrange it? [11:24] Because I wanted to be there. And we just couldn't make it. But I'll tell you something. [11:29] I think that we have a very stark opportunity. Because I think many of our neighbors recognize that there's been a sea change. [11:40] Because of the war, it's not only Hamas. It's Iran. This war is not specifically with Hamas. [11:46] It's with the Iran terror axis of which Hamas was a part. And we dealt a crushing blow to that axis. [11:53] Otherwise, we wouldn't see the changes that we're seeing in the Arab states. [11:57] They understand, again, the permanence of Israel, the strength of Israel. [12:01] And that's how you make peace. Peace with the strong, not with the weak. [12:05] But I look forward to having peace with not only with the broadening of the Abraham Accords inside the Middle East with other Arab countries, [12:16] but with Islamic countries, big Islamic countries outside Israel. And I think that's possible. [12:23] We have to understand there's a pivot here. And I recognize that pivot. And I extended my hand yesterday in the Knesset to anyone who wants peace with us is going to get it. [12:31] Let's talk about the broader world. There was a poll that came out recently in America finding that just 14% of Americans under 30, [12:39] so young people in America, say their sympathies lie with Israel and with the Israeli people. [12:44] That is a very small percentage. You are losing young people across the political spectrum in America and across the world. [12:51] Is there a fix for that? I think so. I think the first fix is to finish the war as speedily as possible. [12:58] Something that I have sought to do against all this contrarian propaganda. Of course I want to end the war. Who wants it to continue? [13:06] I've been to war myself. I've been in battles. I was wounded in battle against terrorists, hijackers. [13:14] My brother died leading a historic rescue at Entebbe for the release of hostages. [13:21] I'm aware. When I was 18 in the army, a fellow soldier died in my arms. [13:27] I've seen my mother and father grieve. I've seen the parents in Israel grieve. [13:34] You have to be crazy to want wars to prolong. [13:36] So ending the war? [13:38] End the war speedily because in the TikTok age and in the television age, [13:44] going on for letting wars go on too long is going to cost you precisely what it costs you. [13:51] And that can recover, at least partly, when you finish the war and you move on to what I hope will be the era of peace. [13:59] I think there's another thing. I mean, there's a real battle on the social media. It's a big battle. [14:06] It is. It is. [14:07] It's a battle for truth, really, because of the lies that are foisted against us. [14:11] And when you have a lot of investment in that, then it obviously does its damage. [14:18] But I think we can recover. [14:19] It's also a battle of messaging, of ideas. [14:23] And there's a big idea that the world talks about and that America talks about, the two-state solution, [14:28] something that you used to talk about but not anymore. How come? [14:33] When I talked about it, it wasn't the proposition that people give. [14:37] I assume, okay, there are two sovereign states, and a sovereign state has, for example, military power. [14:43] It can make covenants. It can make military pacts with, you know, with anyone. [14:48] That's not what I said. [14:49] I said—and I explained it, too. And people refused to listen to the explanation. [14:55] I said, I don't care how you call it. The Palestinians should have all the powers in a peaceful day to govern themselves. [15:01] But they can't have the powers to threaten our survival. [15:05] And that means that the sovereign power of security in this tiny country where the, you know, where this Palestinian entity would be very close to our major cities, [15:15] that sovereign power of security must remain with Israel. [15:19] Because otherwise, the Jihadists take over. Iran takes over immediately. [15:24] And that's what happened. Every time we vacate the territory, the most extreme fanatics came in. [15:29] So, for example, the sovereign power of security, which is an element of sovereignty, that's not going to go to the other side. [15:35] It's going to remain with us. [15:36] And people said to me, but that's not, you know, that's not a perfect state. [15:41] And I said, you're right. But it's perfectly aligned with reality. [15:45] So is that a reality you can imagine existing? [15:48] Well, it's a reality that if you had Palestinian governance that stopped teaching their kids to destroy the state of Israel, [15:56] stopped teaching, pay for slay, pay for murders. [16:00] The more they murder Jews, the more you pay them. [16:03] Stop educating them also that Israel has to be destroyed and so on, and they have to be suicide bombers. [16:09] Obviously, if you have that and they educate them for peace, then I think you can have a different reality. [16:14] But even under that reality, because as you say, this could take generations, [16:19] Israel has to be in control of the military power to prevent our destruction. [16:26] And that's what I believe. And that's when I said that. [16:29] I said the way to talk about it is not to give it names, branding it. [16:33] You can brand it any way you want. [16:36] But the reality is I don't want to govern the Palestinians in Ramallah. [16:41] I don't want to govern them in Jenin. [16:43] I don't want to govern them in whatever, in their towns. [16:46] Let them govern themselves. [16:48] But I do want to make sure that the most important things that protect Israel's security [16:54] and, of course, guarantee our protection against violent anti-Semitism and incitement for our destruction, [17:03] those powers remain with us. [17:05] I hear you. I hear you. I have to ask you about something that's at the very center of criticism and hatred of Israel at times. [17:12] The number one criticism of Israel is that you have been negligent with civilian life in Gaza. [17:18] We hear numbers. They come from the Hamas-run health agencies. [17:22] Do you have an estimate of the number of civilians killed? And how do you respond? [17:28] Look, we think we eliminated about 20,000 Hamas terrorists. [17:33] And we think that if you take away the people who die anyway from disease or old age, that, by the way, is computed in the civilian casualties. [17:41] If you take that away, you take away the double counting and so on. [17:44] The ratio is less than 2 to 1, which is unbelievable in urban conflict. [17:51] I mean, it's not what you saw when the NATO powers went into Iraq or went into Afghanistan. [17:57] That's not the ratio that they had. They had a high ratio. [18:00] That's what the greatest scholars of military warfare, urban warfare, tell us. [18:05] So Israel actually went to lengths that no modern army has done, like millions of text messages, phone calls to people, to Palestinians. [18:16] Hey, get out of harm's way. And Hamas does the opposite. [18:20] They tell them, you don't leave. And if you leave, we shoot you. [18:22] We shoot women, children. We shoot you in the legs. [18:25] So you stay in the combat areas so we can have military casualties. [18:29] And under that situation, what has been, what Israel has done is amazing. [18:35] But of course you won't hear that. [18:36] Because the minute you see a picture of one casualty, which is a tragedy, any civilian casualty is a tragedy. [18:42] You know, for us, it's a tragedy. But for Hamas, it's a strategy. [18:47] So basically, the world is taken completely, bought hook, line and sinker, both false statistics of Hamas and also the false causality. [18:57] The reason you have civilian casualties is because Hamas doesn't let them leave the combat zones, which we beg them to leave, including now in Gaza. [19:05] Just one more question, because I know your night is long already. I want you to take me into the future. [19:11] Someone in your cabinet recently told me, Israel has been living with the sword for more than 100 years. [19:19] Take me into the future. Paint me a picture of when this is over. [19:23] What will it take for you to say, it's done and we've won? [19:28] Well, I think that for the foreseeable future, not only for Israel, but for the free world and for the civilized world, [19:39] you have to maintain your ability to defend yourself because freedom is not permanent, nor is it automatic. [19:47] If you cannot defend free societies, they will be overtaken by authoritarian or totalitarian regimes. It's not. There's no other way. [19:57] It sounds like 100 years with the sword is going to be another 100 years with the sword. [20:01] No, I think not. I think not. I think, in fact, that I think that the way you purchase peace is through strength. [20:10] And those who refuse to see that, you know, the Arab countries, many Arab countries were secretly telling us, [20:16] we're so glad of what you're doing because you're basically cutting down the people who want to destroy us. [20:24] And we are taking these steps to modernity in the Gulf states and elsewhere. [20:28] But these barbarians want to take us back to the Middle Ages, early Middle Ages. [20:32] So please complete the job because this will bring us an era of peace. [20:37] Those who think that peace is bought only by positive intentions of one side with the other side remaining armed and fanatic, they're wrong. [20:48] I extended my hand to the Arab countries and Muslim countries who want peace with us. [20:54] And I believe that because of the degradation that we degraded against Hamas, against Hezbollah, against Nasrallah, [21:02] and all these other mass murders, against Iran, I think that is creating opportunities for peace that we haven't even imagined. [21:11] And remember, I made peace with four Arab states, with President Trump, when everybody said it's not going to happen. [21:19] Netanyahu doesn't want peace. I made four historic peace agreements in two months with people who had shown me that they really want peace with us. [21:29] And I'm telling you now that we have an opportunity to broaden that peace following the chain of victories. [21:35] It's not yet finished, but it's getting there. I hope it'll be there very soon and very peaceful. [21:40] I think we have an opportunity to make peace with many, many more. [21:46] And that will be, I think, the greatest gift. [21:50] We can bring the people of Israel, the people of the region, and the people of the world. [21:56] Thank you, Mr. Prime Minister. [21:57] Thank you. [21:58] Appreciate it. [22:00] Thank you. [22:01] Thank you. [22:02] Thank you.