An influential Israeli diplomat recently cited the Bible to justify that Israel has a right to its land. Deputy foreign minister Tzipi Hotovely reportedly pulled from a biblical commentator to claim that God gave the land to the Israelites, according to The Blaze.
“Rashi says the Torah opens with the story of the creation of the world so that if the nations of the world come and tell you that you are occupiers, you must respond that all of the land belonged to the creator of world and when he wanted to, he took from them and gave to us,” Hotovely said.
“It is important to say that this land is ours, all of it is ours. We didn’t come here to apologize for this.
The speech, delivered to foreign ministry employees was found to be controversial.
Hotovely defended her statement saying, “We sought to present arguments that would play well diplomatically, but currently it’s important to be right. We need to get back to the basic truth of our right to this land.”
Publication date: May 26, 2015
