Live Update arrow right icon From the Liveblog of Monday, July 29, 2024

Netanyahu visits site of deadly Majdal Shams attack, vows ‘harsh response’; some locals tell him to leave

By Lazar Berman 29 July 2024, 3:44 pm 8 Edit

Lazar Berman is The Times of Israel's diplomatic reporter

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits at the scene of a missile attack on a soccer field in the northern Druze village of Majdal Shams that killed 12 children two days earlier, July 29, 2024. (Michael Giladi/Flash90)
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits at the scene of a missile attack on a soccer field in the northern Druze village of Majdal Shams that killed 12 children two days earlier, July 29, 2024. (Michael Giladi/Flash90)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits the soccer field in Majdal Shams where a rocket killed 12 children on Saturday, and pledges a “harsh response.”

“Hezbollah, with Iranian backing, launched an Iranian rocket here, which took the lives of 12 pure souls,” says Netanyahu at the site. “Twelve boys and girls who played soccer here and unfortunately could not get to the shelter. The heart is torn apart by the severe tragedy. We embrace the families who are going through indescribable suffering.”

“These children are our children, they are all the children of all of us, ” he says, according to his office. “Israel will not and cannot let this simply pass on by. Our response will come, and it will be harsh.”

Netanyahu lays a wreath at the site as well.

Netanyahu says that Jews and Druze are brothers: “We have a covenant of life, but unfortunately it is also a covenant of moments of bereavement and grief. We embrace you.”

He urges the Druze community not to lose hope, and pledges that Israel will stand by their side, “today, tomorrow and forever.”

The visit was under censorship until he left the town.

Netanyahu, accompanied by Shin Bet director Ronen Bar, IDF Chief of Staff Tzachi Braverman, PMO director General Yossi Shelly, military secretary Maj. Gen. Roman Goffman, Israeli Druze spiritual leader Muafek Tarif, and the heads of the Majdal Shams and Ein Qiniya local councils, also visits with grieving family members.

A crowd of locals clad in black — about ten rows deep — pushes up against barriers as Netanyahu tours the site, some yelling out to the premier to leave.

Others hold up signs calling Netanyahu a war criminal, while a larger group claps their hands and chants, “Out! Out!”

 

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