BBC journalist Anjana Gadgil on Wednesday shut down her Twitter account, apparently over backlash following her interview with former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, in which she insisted that "the Israeli forces are happy to kill children.”
As of Wednesday night, her Twitter account @AnjanaGadgil is inactive.
Bennett fired back at Gadgil following her remarks, asking her, “What would you call a 17-year-old person with a rifle shooting at your family and murdering your own family? How would you define that person?”
Gadgil then insisted, “The UN has defined them as children, and we know that four people between the age of 16 and 18 have been killed in this targeted attack. Let’s not forget it’s a targeted attack. The Israeli forces are going and looking for these people.”
Bennett then told her, “You know, a 17-year-old terrorist can murder civilians. There’s a fundamental difference between what they’re doing, which is explicitly and deliberately targeting civilians, and what we’re doing, which is targeting terrorists. That’s exactly the opposite.”
Gadgil’s comments were met with criticism, with European Jewish Association chairman Rabbi Menachem Margolin sending a letter of complaint to the Director General of the BBC.
The BBC issued a response to Rabbi Margolin's letter, stating, “We have received comments and complaints concerning an interview with the former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett about recent events in the West Bank and Israel. The complaints raised relate to specific interview questions about the deaths of young people in the Jenin refugee camp.”
“Across the BBC’s platforms – including the BBC news channel – these events have been covered in an impartial and robust way. The United Nations raised the issue of the impact of the operation in Jenin on children and young people. While this was a legitimate subject to examine in the interview, we apologize that the language used in this line of questioning was not phrased well and was inappropriate.”
The Board of Deputies of British Jews also criticized Gadgil’s conduct during the interview, saying in a statement on Wednesday, “We are appalled by comments made by a BBC presenter during an interview with former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett. The comments made, including the charge that ‘Israeli forces are happy to kill children’ when discussing armed terrorists under the age of 18, is simply disgraceful. This is a clear breach of the Corporation’s own Editorial Guidelines, and we will be contacting the Director General personally to protest in the strongest possible terms.”