Channel 12 News commentator Arad Nir sparked outrage on Wednesday after claiming that the tent camp Israel is setting up for Gaza civilians constitutes a “concentration camp,” drawing a comparison to the Nazi camps used against Jews.
“The declared intention here in Israel to turn Rafah into a humanitarian safe haven area - a euphemism for a concentration camp - with the intent to transfer and funnel the population there,” Nir said.
A visibly surprised anchor in the studio responded, “Concentration camp? That takes us back to other times,” to which Nir doubled down: “A concentration camp is a concentration camp. When people are gathered in tent camps amid ruins and are given food there - it’s a concentration camp, and we must also remember the historical connotation.”
Journalist Shirit Avitan-Cohen, also present in the studio panel, pushed back: “With all the drama, you cannot compare the tent city being established to a concentration camp. When we were put in concentration camps decades ago, it was to exterminate us. Israel is trying to establish a humanitarian zone - to provide civilians with food, water, medicine, and shelter, and to separate them from Hamas so we can end this war.”
Minister Amichai Chikli called for Nir’s immediate dismissal. “Arad Nir’s words are extremely grave. First, they amount to Holocaust distortion if he truly sees any similarity between Buchenwald and Bergen-Belsen and humanitarian aid compounds. Second, his words serve as a weapon for enemy propaganda that seeks to dehumanize and Nazify the State of Israel.”
“A glaring red line has been crossed,” Chikli continued. “I expect Channel 12 News to unequivocally disavow these statements and fire Arad Nir immediately.”
Yad Vashem, Israel's official Holocaust memorial, also issued a strong rebuke, saying, “The use of the term ‘concentration camp’ in this context - given its deep historical meaning to the Jewish people - is a serious and inappropriate distortion of the Holocaust. The Nazis established concentration camps as part of their ideology-driven mission to exterminate the Jewish people.”
Nir has come under fire in the past. In 2017, he recommended to his followers on Twitter that they follow anti-Israel political cartoonist Carlos Latuff.
Nir described Latuff’s caricatures as "sharp" and pointed out that Latuff, "as usual, does not spare anyone." But for some reason he ignored the antisemitic tone in Latuff’s caricatures and the fact that he often compares between Israel and the Nazis in his caricatures.
Latuff won the annual Iran holocaust denial contest in 2006 due to the anti-Israel character of his drawings.
In 2022, Nir was reprimanded after he presented on his show the results of an election poll and then said, "Netanyahu legitimized the Israeli extreme right-winger Itamar Ben Gvir and put him together with Bezalel Smotrich, who wants the State of Israel to be governed according to Torah law, in a party whose very name causes discomfort, Otzma Yehudit."
Channel 12 News renounced the comments and said, "We encourage a plurality of opinions, but we will not agree to personal positions leaking into news reports."