A video message by Israel’s Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman to mark the Jewish New Year has been criticised for appearing to condone sexual harrasment of Muslim women.
Mr Lieberman appears in the video alongside Matan Gavish, a self-defence instructor from New York, who offers the minister a series of tips on how to fight terrorists.
With a woman wearing a niqab standing between them, the instructor tells Mr Lieberman in one segment that “terroristim” can be identified by using a selfie stick.
“You pretend to be [a] tourist, pretend to take selfie like this,” he says, holding the device in the sky before turning it upside down and sliding it under the woman’s skirt.
“Then quickly, like you do in a car, you check under the burqa,” he says.
At one stage, Mr Lieberman is heard telling Mr Gavish that he hears “a lot of nonsense every day” and so will listen to him too.
The minister later tells Mr Gavish to “leave us alone — we have the Israel Defence Forces, the best soldiers in the world” before wishing all soldiers and people in Israel a Happy New Year.
The video mimics the style of Sacha Baron Cohen’s recent satirical series Who Is America, in which he portrays fictional Israeli anti-terrorism expert Erran Morad.
But the clip drew criticism on social media.
Anna Ahronheim, the Jerusalem Post’s military and defence correspondent said it was “Not funny in the least. Especially the segment of taking pictures under the woman’s burqa.”
“The Defence Ministry can do better than this,” she adds.
Looks like I'm not the only one who thinks #Israel's Defense Minister @AvigdorLiberman is encouraging sexual assault in his Rosh Hashana greeting to #IDF soldiers https://t.co/5fHrUlBuNz
— Anna Ahronheim (@AAhronheim) September 4, 2018
Orit Sulitzeanu, director of the Association of Rape Crisis Centres in Israel, told the website Mako that “sexual humiliation of Muslim women as a blessing for the New Year is twisted and distorted.”
Sources at the Defence Ministry described the video as a humorous video for the Jewish New Year.
