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Netanyahu: Fruit of Iranian Aggression is Bittersweet

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JERUSALEM, Israel – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants the world to know that his country often finds itself in continual conflict. He told foreign journalists how Israel not only fights terrorism within its own borders, but it also helps the rest of the world to follow suit.

Netanyahu made the most of an opportunity in front of international reporters to tell them how Israel is taking on its greatest enemy: Iran.
 
"We are fighting that nuclear deal – I had to fight it against all the powers in the world, but I'm glad to see that this is changed," he told them. "We're stopping them from having [a] continuity of land empire by preventing them from entrenching themselves militarily in Syria; we're stopping that.  And of course, the extension of that is we're preventing their proxy, Hezbollah in Lebanon, from attacking us through terror tunnels [and] precision-guided missiles."


Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Addresses Foreign Journalists, Photo, CBN News, Jonathan Goff
 
The prime minister also showed his audience how Israel provided what he called "unmatched intelligence" to stop terror attacks around the world.

"This is the plane bound from Sydney to Abu Dhabi. Daesh [ISIS] planned to bring it down, explode it in the air. We gave the intelligence to the Australian police and they stopped it. There are about 40 other such terrorist attacks on the ground, many in the air – many in the air, most on the ground, which we've stopped in virtually all the continents," he said.
 
According to Netanyahu, Israel's efforts to keep the world safe has also brought the Arab world closer to the Jewish state.

"Obviously this has created a new relationship between Israel and the Arab world. Some of it is coming to the open," he said.
 
Netanyahu highlighted his recent trip to the Gulf State of Oman and how Israeli athletes competed in competitions held in Arab countries.

"Arab countries understand exactly what I'm telling you now: that Israel is not their enemy but is their indispensable partner for countering this radicalism, this terrorism, that threatens them as much as us," he said. "That is, the fruits of Iranian aggression are bitter, but [they're] also sweet."
 
Netanyahu pointed to other reasons why these countries are becoming friendlier, chief among them technology.

"They want also a civilian technology in anything – in health, in water management, in IT, in agriculture. Our technology encompasses just about everything, and they want to have the benefit to develop their own countries with this technology," he said.
 
And then the prime minister offered reporters a message to take to their audience.

"So the story that is taking place here, the news story is this: Israel is a world force in countering radical Islam. The Arabs get it, the Muslims get it, and they're coming closer to us. Israel is a world force in global technology. Everybody gets that. Everybody," he said.

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About The Author

Julie Stahl
Julie
Stahl

Julie Stahl is a correspondent for CBN News in the Middle East. A Hebrew speaker, she has been covering news in Israel full-time for more than 20 years. Julie’s life as a journalist has been intertwined with CBN – first as a graduate student in Journalism, then as a journalist with Middle East Television (METV) when it was owned by CBN from 1989-91, and now with the Middle East Bureau of CBN News in Jerusalem since 2009. As a correspondent for CBN News, Julie has covered Israel’s wars with Gaza, rocket attacks on Israeli communities, stories on the Jewish communities in Judea, Samaria, and the