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Watch: Russian TV Host Compares Israeli Actions to Nazi Atrocities, Gaza War to Holocaust in Wild On-Air Rant
Russian TV host Armen Gasparyan goes on an anti-Israel rant on his eponymous current affairs show “Gasparyan.” Photo: Screenshot
The host of a highly popular Russian TV show recently accused an Israeli guest of “justifying the murder of Palestinian children,” compared Israeli claims of Hamas’ use of human shields to those made by the Nazis during World War II, and even drew a comparison between the war in Gaza and the Holocaust.
Israeli-Russian journalist Nick Kolyohin was interviewed by Armen Gasparyan, host of the eponymous current affairs show “Gasparyan,” about the ongoing war in Gaza. Gasparyan asked Kolyohin why Israel’s military campaign against the Hamas terror group, which rules Gaza, had not ended “despite the fact that 15,000 Palestinian children have been killed,” and requested that Kolyohin “be objective” in his response.
Kolyohin said that while there were certainly “peaceful civilians” in Gaza, not all of them were innocent.
Kolyohin cited former Israeli hostages who he had interviewed as saying that Hamas terrorists cynically use Gazan children to bring them items, including food and weapons, into the Palestinian terror group’s extensive network of underground tunnels.
“Children are sometimes used as a tool for terrorists. Sometimes the [terrorists] threaten their families leaving them with no other option, or it might be the only way for them to earn money,” Kolyohin said. “But sometimes they genuinely believe in what they’re doing because they are brainwashed to think that Jews are evil, and they must be killed.”
Kolyohin went on to say that while some Palestinian civilians are being used by Hamas as human shields, others actively aid the terrorists. He pointed to acts of barbarity committed by Palestinian civilians on Oct. 7 itself. Waves of Palestinians who were not affiliated with Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad, another Iran-backed terrorist group in Gaza, took advantage of the breached border and stormed Israeli communities, many of whom were caught on surveillance cameras stealing, murdering, and even kidnapping Israeli civilians back to Gaza.
“We shouldn’t think about everyone in the same way. Some may be peaceful and some may not,” Kolyohin told Gasparyan.
Gasparyan thanked Kolyohin for his time before launching into a diatribe against him. “Friends, I apologize for the horror of what we just broadcast on the air,” Gasparyan prefaced.
“I never thought that I would hear a justification for the murder of children on my show,” he said.
“It’s one thing to read about such things in various intellectual books about Nazism and understand that this was all condemned at the Nuremberg trials as a grave crime,” he went on. “But quite another thing when sitting in the studio, microphone in front of you, and you are told, ever so calmly, that [children] are being used by Hamas.”
Gasparyan compared the allegations to those made by the Nazis during World War II to justify the murder of children of members of Soviet partisan guerilla groups.
“Listening to someone justifying the murder of children — that’s something new, that’s the very worst,” he said.
He went on to say that Israel is a state “founded by people who survived the Holocaust — the worst ever catastrophe.”
“You would think they would be the last ones who would perpetrate one. Yet here we’ve heard everything that was said now, in a totally calm manner,” Gasparyan continued.
“We have to ask: where will we end up?” he added. “What is the next stage? Justifying the use of nuclear weapons in the Gaza Strip under the pretense of dealing with those tunnels? [They’d say] ‘Hamas left us no other choice, right?’”
Gasparyan’s show is wildly popular on Solovyov Live, a channel run by Russian TV presenter and propagandist Vladimir Solovyov. With tens of millions of viewers on the Telegram channel alone, “Gasparyan” is ranked No. 2 on Solovyov Live, second only to Solvyov’s own TV show. YouTube blocked the channel after Russia invaded Ukraine in Feb. 2022.
Kolyohin described Gasparyan’s takedown of him as “highly offensive” and castigated the Russian host for not speaking his mind while the Israeli journalist was still on air.
“I couldn’t defend myself. It wasn’t only offensive; it was scary,” Kolyohin told The Algemeiner in a phone call from St. Petersburg. “When you are compared to the most evil thing that happened in our history, it’s awful.”
“People watching could believe the anchor. This is scary and dangerous in today’s world,” he said.
Kolyohin accused the Russian press of extreme propaganda. “They see everyone as Nazis. Not just Ukrainians, but Israelis also.”
In the months following the Hamas-led massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, Russian sympathies transferred from Israelis to Palestinians, Kolyohin said, in a shift that was partly driven by the Arab and Muslim world which understood the value in shoring up Russian support. The Israel-Hamas war was leveraged to highlight the “double standards of the West and its hypocrisy” in its dealings with both Russia and the Muslim world, he said.
“It’s a cynical, geopolitical game,” he added.
Kolyohin, who divides his time between Moscow and Tel Aviv, said he was not worried about speaking in defense of Israel on pro-Russian news channels.
“This profession is a scary one everywhere, not just here,” he said. “I think it’s a mistake not to speak, even if I don’t accept their agenda. I believe that if you are speaking the truth and not speaking hate, people will understand what I’m saying and accept it.”
Watch Kolyohin’s comments on Solovyov Live and Gasparyan’s subsequent diatribe below:
The post Watch: Russian TV Host Compares Israeli Actions to Nazi Atrocities, Gaza War to Holocaust in Wild On-Air Rant first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Iran, US Task Experts to Design Framework for a Nuclear Deal, Tehran Says
Atomic symbol and USA and Iranian flags are seen in this illustration taken, September 8, 2022. Photo: REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
Iran and the United States agreed on Saturday to task experts to start drawing up a framework for a potential nuclear deal, Iran’s foreign minister said, after a second round of talks following President Donald Trump’s threat of military action.
At their second indirect meeting in a week, Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi negotiated for almost four hours in Rome with Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, through an Omani official who shuttled messages between them.
Trump, who abandoned a 2015 nuclear pact between Tehran and world powers during his first term in 2018, has threatened to attack Iran unless it reaches a new deal swiftly that would prevent it from developing a nuclear weapon.
Iran, which says its nuclear program is peaceful, says it is willing to discuss limited curbs to its atomic work in return for lifting international sanctions.
Speaking on state TV after the talks, Araqchi described them as useful and conducted in a constructive atmosphere.
“We were able to make some progress on a number of principles and goals, and ultimately reached a better understanding,” he said.
“It was agreed that negotiations will continue and move into the next phase, in which expert-level meetings will begin on Wednesday in Oman. The experts will have the opportunity to start designing a framework for an agreement.”
The top negotiators would meet again in Oman next Saturday to “review the experts’ work and assess how closely it aligns with the principles of a potential agreement,” he added.
Echoing cautious comments last week from Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, he added: “We cannot say for certain that we are optimistic. We are acting very cautiously. There is no reason either to be overly pessimistic.”
There was no immediate comment from the US side following the talks. Trump told reporters on Friday: “I’m for stopping Iran, very simply, from having a nuclear weapon. They can’t have a nuclear weapon. I want Iran to be great and prosperous and terrific.”
Washington’s ally Israel, which opposed the 2015 agreement with Iran that Trump abandoned in 2018, has not ruled out an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities in the coming months, according to an Israeli official and two other people familiar with the matter.
Since 2019, Iran has breached and far surpassed the 2015 deal’s limits on its uranium enrichment, producing stocks far above what the West says is necessary for a civilian energy program.
A senior Iranian official, who described Iran’s negotiating position on condition of anonymity on Friday, listed its red lines as never agreeing to dismantle its uranium enriching centrifuges, halt enrichment altogether or reduce its enriched uranium stockpile below levels agreed in the 2015 deal.
The post Iran, US Task Experts to Design Framework for a Nuclear Deal, Tehran Says first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Hamas Says Fate of US-Israeli Hostage Unknown After Guard Killed in Israel Strike
Varda Ben Baruch, the grandmother of Edan Alexander, 19, an Israeli army volunteer kidnapped by Hamas, attends a special Kabbalat Shabbat ceremony with families of other hostages, in Herzliya, Israel October 27, 2023 REUTERS/Kuba Stezycki
Hamas said on Saturday the fate of an Israeli dual national soldier believed to be the last US citizen held alive in Gaza was unknown, after the body of one of the guards who had been holding him was found killed by an Israeli strike.
A month after Israel abandoned the ceasefire with the resumption of intensive strikes across the breadth of Gaza, Israel was intensifying its attacks.
President Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff said in March that freeing Edan Alexander, a 21-year-old New Jersey native who was serving in the Israeli army when he was captured during the Oct. 7, 2023 attacks that precipitated the war, was a “top priority.” His release was at the center of talks held between Hamas leaders and US negotiator Adam Boehler last month.
Hamas had said on Tuesday that it had lost contact with the militants holding Alexander after their location was hit in an Israeli attack. On Saturday it said the body of one of the guards had been recovered.
“The fate of the prisoner and the rest of the captors remains unknown,” said Hamas armed wing Al-Qassam Brigades’ spokesperson Abu Ubaida.
“We are trying to protect all the hostages and preserve their lives … but their lives are in danger because of the criminal bombings by the enemy’s army,” Abu Ubaida said.
The Israeli military did not respond to a Reuters request for comment.
Hamas released 38 hostages under the ceasefire that began on January 19. Fifty-nine are still believed to be held in Gaza, fewer than half of them still alive.
Israel put Gaza under a total blockade in March and restarted its assault on March 18 after talks failed to extend the ceasefire. Hamas says it will free remaining hostages only under an agreement that permanently ends the war; Israel says it will agree only to a temporary pause.
On Friday, the Israeli military said it hit about 40 targets across the enclave over the past day. The military on Saturday announced that a 35-year-old soldier had died in combat in Gaza.
NETANYAHU STATEMENT
Late on Thursday Khalil Al-Hayya, Hamas’ Gaza chief, said the movement was willing to swap all remaining 59 hostages for Palestinians jailed in Israel in return for an end to the war and reconstruction of Gaza.
He dismissed an Israeli offer, which includes a demand that Hamas lay down its arms, as imposing “impossible conditions.”
Israel has not responded formally to Al-Hayya’s comments, but ministers have said repeatedly that Hamas must be disarmed completely and can play no role in the future governance of Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is scheduled to give a statement later on Saturday.
Hamas on Saturday also released an undated and edited video of Israeli hostage Elkana Bohbot. Hamas has released several videos over the course of the war of hostages begging to be released. Israeli officials have dismissed past videos as propaganda.
After the video was released, Bohbot’s family said in a statement that they were “deeply shocked and devastated,” and expressed concern for his mental and physical condition.
“How much longer will he be expected to wait and ‘stay strong’?” the family asked, urging for all of the 59 hostages who are still held in Gaza to be brought home.
The post Hamas Says Fate of US-Israeli Hostage Unknown After Guard Killed in Israel Strike first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Oman’s Sultan to Meet Putin in Moscow After Iran-US Talks
FILE PHOTO: Sultan Haitham bin Tariq al-Said gives a speech after being sworn in before the royal family council in Muscat, Oman January 11, 2020. Photo: REUTERS/Sultan Al Hasani/File Photo
Oman’s Sultan Haitham bin Tariq al-Said is set to visit Moscow on Monday, days after the start of a round of Muscat-mediated nuclear talks between the US and Iran.
The sultan will hold talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday, the Kremlin said.
Iran and the US started a new round of nuclear talks in Rome on Saturday to resolve their decades-long standoff over Tehran’s atomic aims, under the shadow of President Donald Trump’s threat to unleash military action if diplomacy fails.
Ahead of Saturday’s talks, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi met his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in Moscow. Following the meeting, Lavrov said Russia was “ready to assist, mediate and play any role that will be beneficial to Iran and the USA.”
Moscow has played a role in Iran’s nuclear negotiations in the past as a veto-wielding U.N. Security Council member and signatory to an earlier deal that Trump abandoned during his first term in 2018.
The sultan’s meetings in Moscow visit will focus on cooperation on regional and global issues, the Omani state news agency and the Kremlin said, without providing further detail.
The two leaders are also expected to discuss trade and economic ties, the Kremlin added.
The post Oman’s Sultan to Meet Putin in Moscow After Iran-US Talks first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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