Smotrich: Steve Witkoff called Gaza Palestinians ‘two million Nazis’

Smotrich: Steve Witkoff called Gaza Palestinians ‘two million Nazis’ Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has said US envoy Steve Witkoff described Gaza’s entire population as “two million Nazis” during a private meeting last year. Speaking at a conference in Israel on Thursday, the far-right minister recounted a conversation held after Witkoff’s visited Gaza last August at the height of the Israeli genocide. Smotrich said: "When Witkoff was appointed, I sat with him and Ron Dermer [former Israeli ambassador to the US]." They showed Witkoff a propaganda video, after which the US envoy turned to Smotrich and reportedly said: "Bezalel, I will not let two million Nazis live next to your children on fences." Witkoff, a former property lawyer with no previous foreign policy or humanitarian experience, publicly presented the Gaza visit as an effort to “help craft a plan to deliver food and medical aid to the people of Gaza”. At the time, Israel was deliberately starving residents by restricting food entering Gaza and driving much of its population towards famine. Smotrich also used the conference to call for permanent Israeli territorial expansion in Lebanon. "There is only one thing that hurts the enemy - land," said Smotrich. "Whoever messes with us will lose land for ever. A security zone needs to be created for years in Lebanon." Read more: Smotrich: Steve Witkoff called Gaza Palestinians ‘two million Nazis’ Steve Witkoff, the US special envoy to the Middle East, pictured in March (Saul Loeb/AFP)