Abuse allegations ‘absolutely, unequivocally inexcusable’, says former Israeli diplomat

We’re joined by Alon Pinkas, a former Israeli diplomat who has been chief of staff and foreign policy adviser to one Israeli prime minister and four foreign ministers.

Jackie Long: Mr. Pinkas what do you make of what you saw in that report?

Alon Pinkas: Well, it’s very simple. I mean, it’s not very simple, it’s very tragic. But the bottom line is this – even if 50% of these stories are true, even if 25% of their accounts are accurate, it is inexcusable. It is intolerable. Israel should investigate this much more thoroughly than what appeared in the responses, the official responses, that you got. But from a broader perspective, Jackie, you saw both sides here. This just illustrates in a horrific way how dehumanising this entire thing is, how Israelis have been dehumanised, how Palestinians have been dehumanised, how they each dehumanise each other. And in the end, this is what we’re left with.

Jackie Long: As you say, you see both sides in that report. Extraordinary scenes of far right demonstrators storming army bases, storming the courts in protest at the arrest of soldiers for alleged abuse. What do you think the wider Israeli public feel about these allegations?

Alon Pinkas: I have two answers that are kind of incompatible, and I’m sorry for that. The first is that a lot of people are repulsed by it. They don’t like to see this. They don’t like to hear about this. But that leads to the second incompatibility here. And that is your incompatible explanation here – that people prefer to live in denial. You have to understand, Jackie, the devastation and the horror of October 7th caused people to dissociate themselves from the suffering on the other side. What you show on Channel 4, what indeed other international news outlets show, is not seen by the vast majority of Israelis. There is a sense, an understandable sense, of self righteousness and victimhood. On the other hand, when they are exposed to this, it causes the majority of Israelis… What you showed in that interesting story – in that interesting report – is the extreme right wing. Now, I can dismiss them and say they’re an negligible minority, but they’re right there in the government. So I won’t dismiss that. But most Israelis, a majority of Israelis are repulsed by it when they are exposed to it.

Jackie Long: Sorry to interrupt you, but if they are exposed to it – and we see more and more of these reports in recent weeks making the news. We know the United Nations, the EU, a raft of human rights groups are publicly condemning Israel’s treatment of prisoners – does Israel care? What is the collective responsibility to try and stop this?

Alon Pinkas: It does care. The question is, why does it care? For fear of the International Criminal Court or in the National Court of Justice or international public opinion, or does it care because it’s patently illegal, patently immoral, and patently should not be done? I don’t know. The government behaves as if it is more fearful of the legal repercussions abroad than it is about the immorality and inexcusability of all of this. I’m not going to defend the Israeli government. I think this was an abject and abysmal government from day one. But Israel does have mechanisms – legal mechanisms and investigative tools and processes – that deal with these cases. Still, as I said at the outset, Jackie, even if 25% of what’s in that report is accurate, it is absolutely unequivocally inexcusable.