On 21 May 2025 Anna Foster (AF) interviewed Michael Kleiner (MK), President of the Supreme Court of the Likud Party, during the BBC Today Programme. He is a member of the Likud party to which the Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also belongs.

AF: The UK government has made it very clear that it wants Israel to stop this expanded new military offensive in Gaza and to allow aid in at scale. We saw new measures announced yesterday. Is that now going to happen?

MK: First of all, yesterday we entered into Gaza almost 100 trucks, most of them, by the way, with medical equipment. And, you know, we’ll be very happy to respond positively to the demand to stop fighting. That’s why Israel accepted the Witkoff program or proposal as is, 100 percent Israel agreed to, and the ones who refused to it are Hamas. The moment Hamas will agree to the Witkoff agreement or any other agreement, and will let go those hostages that were kidnapped from their home, which were not, most of them were kidnapped from their homes, and, you know, in exchange for murderers and terrorists. And we do it. We are ready to release thousands of murderers who sit in prison, who made real crimes. So the moment Hamas will decide it stops, it stops. I don’t know why the address is Israel. Why don’t those people who criticize Israel approach the other side to accept the American proposal?

AF: Mr. Klein, a couple of things from your answer there that I’d like to pick up on. The first is where you talked about those 100 trucks that, yes, have passed to the Palestinian side of the crossing, but are now held up. They’re not being given permission to go any further. And that aid has not reached any Palestinians in Gaza who need it at the moment. What is the problem there? Why has that happened?

MK: You know that the main problem, which is all the time the problem, that Hamas is taking over the convoys. 

AF: But right now, Mr. Kleiner, right now, when there are people waiting to take that aid, why is it not being given permission to progress into Gaza?

MK: No, no. They went into Gaza. The 100 trucks today will go into Gaza during the day. We want to do as much as possible to prevent the possibility that Hamas will take over the food and we want to ensure it will reach the population.

AF: But at the moment it’s not reaching anybody. It’s trapped at the border. 

MK: Not with the profiteering price that Hamas is taking from them which is imaginary, which they don’t have the money. Hamas is the enemy of the Palestinian population, not Israel. Europe doesn’t understand it. If somebody would have gone to Dresden in 1945 and take a snapshot, everybody would say, how miserable are those victims, the German victims, and how cruel are the British for bombarding them.

AF: Well, on the point of the bombardment, let’s talk about the bombardment, which continues. And again, the UK government said yesterday very clearly that they want the expansion of that fighting to stop. More Palestinians have been killed overnight. The hostage families forum, they themselves oppose expanded fighting. They want their loved ones home. Of course they do. But they themselves do not want to see this expanded fighting. Why is it continuing?

MK: No, first of all the hostages I can understand. If I had been a child then I wouldn’t look at the whole picture, at the national picture of national interest. I would have looked about getting back my children and nobody, and I would have been right and nobody should listen to me. My complaint is not about those miserable families. My complaint is against people in Europe who don’t support us, who don’t put their finger on the real party to blame, the one who started the war, who say there wouldn’t have been 7th of October, no one single baby in Gaza would have been harmed.

AF: But Israel has had, Mr Kleiner, a huge amount of support from its allies. But as David Lammy, the UK Foreign Secretary said in the Commons yesterday, opposing the expansion of a war that has killed thousands of children is not rewarding Hamas.

MK: Now, look, once again, I don’t speak about what happened in the past. I speak about today. The only demand that we have from Hamas is that they will agree to demilitarize Gaza, to take out those terrorists who use the civilian population as human shields, as they make their lives miserable. There are already demonstrations in Gaza against Hamas from behalf of the population who start to understand who is the one to blame for the misery, because it depends on Hamas. In one moment they can stop it, and we will be the happiest in the world to stop the war. We don’t want our children… My child is in the army, in the paratroops. As a father, I pray every day that they will not go into Gaza and risk his life. But we have no choice. If we keep Hamas there and if we leave Hamas, allow Hamas to stay with their ammunition in Gaza, the Palestinians will be miserable, but also all those Israeli settlements near the border that were attacked on the 7th of October, they will not come back to their homes if Hamas is in Gaza.

AF: Thank you for joining us, a member of the Likud party, president of their Supreme Court.