Israel PM accused of being 'afraid' to criticise Putin for war crimes

Former Jewish Agency chairman Natan Sharansky has said that Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett is afraid to criticize Russian President Vladimir Putin for war crimes committed by Russian forces in Ukraine.

“Israel is mumbling [when faced with] such a clear moral situation of a fight of good against evil, and tries to be on good terms with all sides,” Haaretz quoted Sharansky as saying.

“Our Prime Minister is afraid to call out Putin, who is behind these crimes, by name.”

Truth to power, Mr. Sharansky https://t.co/25kgpkNJaq

— Alon Pinkas (@AlonPinkas) April 7, 2022

The Jewish Agency is a controversial semi-official Israeli body that aids Jewish migration to Israel and has been responsible for taking over Palestinian land.

Natan Sharansky, who served as the chairman of the body from 2009 to 2018, is a former Soviet prisoner who was detained for almost a decade in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

He has also served as the chairman of the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center recently, the same memorial that was attacked by Russian forces last month.  

Russian forces have been accused of war crimes after Ukrainian forces who retook the suburb of Bucha discovered scores of bodies of massacred civilians, some of whom appeared to have been tied up before being killed.

“No doubt its war crimes, crimes against Ukraine, crimes against the free world, and we have to condemn it in the strongest words to fight against it,” said Sharansky.

Israel has tried to remain "neutral" during Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a horrific assault that has so far killed thousands and forced at least 4 million to flee.

Prime Minister Bennett has never directly called out the Kremlin; his government called the killings in Bucha a 'war crime' on Sunday without directly blaming Russian troops or Moscow.