Greater than 4 months into the Israel-Hamas conflict, one social media consumer shared a 4-year-old video and instructed it exhibits Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanhayu finds Arabs unclean.
A Feb. 19 Instagram put up shared a video of Netanyahu at a information convention receiving a microphone from somebody the put up described as a United Arab Emirates official. Netanyahu began to achieve for the mic, then wagged his index finger and rubbed his palms collectively, summoning somebody offscreen.
Sticker textual content above the video learn, “Netanyahu refuses to take mic from UAE official that could be a signal of disrespect in Arab tradition.”
“Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu refuses to take a microphone from a UAE official and calls his help to convey him hand sanitizers which means that they’re unclean,” the put up’s caption learn. The caption additionally mentioned that maybe Netanyahu feared “there was an explosive within the mic as some leaders prior to now have been focused with explosives in mics.”
This Instagram put up was flagged as a part of Meta’s efforts to fight false information and misinformation on its Information Feed. (Learn extra about our partnership with Meta, which owns Fb and Instagram.)
The Instagram put up omits essential context concerning the video to make it appear as if Netanyahu refused to the touch the microphone as a result of an Arab man handed it to him.
(Instagram screenshot)
We discovered the total video on the prime minister’s official X account, @IsraeliPM. It was from a ceremony at Ben Gurion Worldwide Airport in Tel Aviv, Israel, celebrating the primary business airplane flight from Dubai, United Arab Emirates, to Israel.
“That is the primary business flight from Dubai to Israel. It’s a historic flight,” the Nov. 26, 2020 X post learn, linking to a information launch from the prime minister’s workplace, which quoted Netanyahu.
Within the video, after refusing the mic at first, an aide introduced Netanyahu hand sanitizer, which the Israeli chief rubbed on his palms earlier than persevering with to talk.
The occasion’s date, November 2020, was the primary clue that the Instagram put up was deceptive. The world was amid a raging COVID-19 pandemic then. There have been no vaccines obtainable and well being officers have been urging folks to make use of preventive measures similar to masking, social distancing, hand-washing and hand sanitizer. A month after this occasion, Israel introduced a 3rd nationwide lockdown due to surging coronavirus instances in that nation.
The occasion’s full video exhibits extra context about Netanyahu’s motives in requesting the hand sanitizer. It exhibits him arriving on the occasion together with his aides, everybody sporting masks, together with Netanyahu. As an alternative of shaking palms with folks, Netanyahu greeted folks with elbow bumps.
Benjamin Netanyahu bumps arms with folks earlier than information convention at Israel airport in Novemberr 2020.
In March 2020, Netanyahu urged Israelis to alter their conduct in response to the pandemic, together with to chorus from shaking palms, in response to the textual content of his handle revealed by The Instances of Israel.
“We like to embrace. We like to shake palms. We like to kiss. No extra,” Netanyahu mentioned. “I’ve already specified sure modifications that we have to make. First, to chorus from shaking palms, to clean palms. We may even subject directives about that once more, repeatedly, to take care of private hygiene.”
Netanyahu apparently forgot his personal handshake directive in June 2020 when assembly with Brian Hook, the U.S. particular envoy to Iran in former President Donald Trump’s administration.
Later, Netanyahu realized his mistake.
Benjamin Netanyahu talking with U.S. official Brian Hook in June 2020.
“I used to be so swept away by the power of our friendship that I grasped your hand,” Netanyahu mentioned to Hook at a information convention. “So now, we’ll do that as a result of we’re dedicated to the corona regime — and to our friendship.”
The 2 males then used hand sanitizer earlier than bumping elbows for the cameras.
“Elbow shake,” Netanyahu mentioned. “That’s it. That’s so far as we go.”
Historic pictures and movies present Netanyahu shaking palms with Arab leaders prior to now, similar to Palestinian Authority chief Yasser Arafat in 1996, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in 2010, 2015 and 2016. A 2018 video exhibits Netanyahu shaking palms with Sultan Qaboos bin Mentioned throughout a go to to Oman and a 2019 photograph exhibits him shaking palms with Oman’s overseas minister.
In 2019, Netanyahu attended a convention on Center East peace in Warsaw, Poland. In keeping with Trump’s U.S. peace envoy, Jason Greenblatt, the prime minister’s microphone stopped working as he was about to deal with delegates in a session closed to the press. Khaled Alyemany, Yemen’s overseas minister, who was sitting subsequent to Netanyahu, let him use his, The Instances of Israel reported. Hand sanitizer wasn’t talked about.
The Instagram declare that Netanyahu refused to the touch a microphone as a result of an Arab man handed it to him misleads concerning the context surrounding the incident. It got here in the course of the top of the COVID-19 pandemic and as Netanyahu was publicly urging Israelis to take preventive measures like washing palms often. The declare is False.