Fact-Check: Israel's Defence Minister and the Siege of Gaza

Shortly after the 7 October 2023 attacks, did Israel’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant order to impose a siege on Gaza or not? The question is relevant in light of a recent social media controversy in which British-American media personality Mehdi Hasan cited the following remarks attributed to Gallant as proof of “genocidal intent from the start”: “I have ordered a complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed.” In reply, Eylon Levy- a former spokesman for the Israeli government who has continued to make Israel advocacy his shtick since being dismissed- accused Mehdi of lying: “Mehdi Hamas can’t help lying. Gallant did not say this.”

Regardless of one’s views on Israel and Palestine (and for what it’s worth, the “Mehdi Hamas” insult is just gratuitous, and to accuse Mehdi of lying would mean he somehow knows better but is willingly distorting Gallant’s remarks), the truth in this case sides more with Mehdi than it does with Eylon.

In general, when it comes to external coverage of Israel and Palestine, I think research competency in both Hebrew and Arabic would go a long way to providing a more informed discussion, rather than people simply relying on machine or AI translation. I would not be a snob and somehow demand ‘fluency’ in both languages as a prerequisite to providing commentary and analysis, but the fact is that errors in translation can arise and it is always helpful to have human verification. And when you have knowledge of both languages, you can go beyond the headlines in English-language media.

The remarks as Mehdi quotes them are Gallant’s quoted remarks as they appeared in English-language Israeli media. See, for example, the screenshot below from a report by the Times of Israel published on 9 October 2023:

But the Times of Israel report is not a definitive proof. There is the possibility of mistranslation. So what does Gallant say in the original Hebrew?

There is in fact video footage of Gallant’s remarks posted by Knesset TV.

Listening to the audio of his remarks and comparing with the Hebrew transcript, one can quote him as follows in Hebrew:

אנחנו מטילים מצור מוחלט על העיר עזה, אין חשמל, אין מזון, אין מים, אין דלק. הכל סגור

There are two issues here. First, he does not say in the video “I have ordered.” Rather, he begins with: “We are imposing” (אנחנו מטילים). Second, Gaza in Hebrew is עזה (pronounced azah), while Gaza Strip is normally רצועת עזה (lit. “The Strip of Gaza”- typical example of a genitive construction similar to Arabic). Here, however, Gallant speaks of העיר עזה. The word עיר in Hebrew normally means ‘city’, and in fact the phrase העיר עזה has been used in Hebrew-language media to refer to the specific area of Gaza City rather than the whole of the Gaza Strip. For example, during the Gaza war in August 2025, Israeli media discussed military plans to take control of Gaza City. Below, for instance, is a screenshot from an i24News Hebrew-language report headlined: “Plan to occupy Gaza City.”

As such, one could translate Gallant’s remarks, as they appear in the video, as follows: “We are imposing a total siege on Gaza City. No electricity, no food, no water, no fuel. Everything is shut.”

But it seems implausible that at such an early stage, Gallant would only have specified the imposition of a siege on Gaza City and not the entirety of the Strip. Yet the small differences between the translation of the remarks as taken from the video and what is quoted in the Times of Israel report do raise the question of what the English-language reports quoting him are based on. As it turns out, the phrase “I have ordered to impose a total siege on Gaza” comes from Gallant’s official Facebook page, featuring the same video clip of him as broadcast by Knesset TV:

In the caption for the video, one reads:

הוריתי להטיל מצור מוחלט על עזה

The translation- “I have ordered to impose a total siege on Gaza”- is correct here. It seems likely then that the English-language reports are based on this remark that appeared on Gallant’s Facebook page.

In short then, Eylon’s contention that Gallant did not say the remarks attributed to him by Mehdi and the English-language reports strikes me as just hair-splitting at best. Gallant’s intent was clear. He initially wanted to impose a total siege on Gaza as a response to Hamas’ attack. This finding should be evident regardless of whether one wants to use this remark as evidence of genocide or genocidal intent. It is also independent of the question of whether Israel actually implemented a total siege on the ground. This post does not intend to address those two questions.

I cannot say whether Eylon is lying. In general, to accuse someone of lying requires evidence, and I simply do not know whether Eylon is aware of the small but ultimately irrelevant distinction between Gallant’s remarks in the video and the caption of the video on his official Facebook page.

But this episode does strike me as indicative of the way Eylon acts on social media. It is, in fact, a pattern I have observed among a number of personalities who gain a large social media following of a strong ideological bent, often bringing with it a viable income. In my view, they feel compelled to play to their audience’s basest instincts, hence the vitriol and a tendency to say things that are evidently untrue, either as a product of ignorance or wilful distortion.

We should demand better than this and be committed to discovering the truth regardless of where it takes us. The person from whom I most imbibed this lesson in my younger years was the late Israeli-American scholar Barry Rubin (d. 2014 CE), who was himself very committed to Israel. I did not always agree with Barry’s analysis, but from him I did learn that we should be wary of personalities seeking attention from a particular audience and saying things that were clearly incorrect, whether as a product of ignorance or distortion.