Ambassador Azar: Israel has worked excellently with Romanian gov't in its efforts to free hostages

The State of Israel has had an excellent collaboration with the Romanian government in terms of the efforts to free the hostages in the Gaza Strip after the Hamas attacks of October 7, Israel's ambassador to Bucharest, Reuven Azar, who ends his diplomatic mission in our country in August, said in an interview with Agerpres."I didn't mean the hostages in particular. We are talking about a general effort, which addresses several aspects - whether it is intelligence exchanges, the evacuation of people from dangerous areas - Romanian or Israeli citizens -, diplomatic dialogue with the parties involved (...) we will continue cooperation to free all the hostages, because we must continue until all the hostages are freed," the diplomat said.In the interview, given on Tuesday, July 30, at 15:00, Reuven Azar also speaks about the recent tensions between his country and Lebanon, saying that on October 8, in an unprovoked way, Hezbollah began attacking northern Israel with hundreds of rockets, drones and caused serious damage to the border area, so that "we had to evacuate about 80,000 people from this area. It is very important to understand that 80,000 people will not return to the border area if they do not feel safe. This means that the Hezbollah forces, 15,000 terrorists who have threatened the locals in the border area, must leave the area, because no one will agree - after what happened on October 7, with the Hamas attacks, with arson and mass murder - to return to these places, in the context of such threats.""No one in Israel is happy about the prospect of attacking Lebanon and we had a clear and very reserved message when we talk about a retaliation or defending ourselves from this threat. But the glass was filled. At some point we have to take measures and, when we draw the line, we have to have negotiations, because we want to be in the context in which to negotiate peace with Lebanon. But these things can happen when the Lebanese people decide they don't want to attack Israel anymore. This is not the case at the moment," the ambassador stressed."We must make sure that Hamas does not regroup and rearm to attack Israel again, as it did on October 7. We have already declared that we do not want to administrate the Gaza Strip indefinitely. We will remain militarily in Gaza as long as this threat continues. If we come to have a force that is committed not to attacking Israel, then Israel will withdraw. It will not be easy, because no one in the world is willing to fight Hamas. So no one will fight Hamas for us. We have to do this, and if Hamas refuses, we have to be there and fight them," Reuven Azar went on.The ambassador said that "It is not a question of freeing ourselves from Hamas. The Palestinians must free themselves from Hamas if they want to have a future, because their future is completely hijacked by extremist terrorists who want to change the course of the Middle East. It's not just about the Palestinian matter. It is an axis of evil, supported by Iran, which is trying to have hegemony in the region, with an extremist agenda and which will impose this hegemony in the civilized world - in Europe, in the United States of America. And we see this, we see extremists demonstrating with Hamas flags in Europe, in the United States. It's clear what the purpose is. Israel is stopping this wave of extremism from invading the civilized world. So instead of focusing on Israel, which does an extraordinary job when it comes to the ratio of terror victims to civilian victims, pressure should be put on extremists."When asked about the arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court against prime minister Netanyahu for war crimes, valid in most European countries, ambassador Azar answered that "there are no war crimes in Gaza (...) The war criminals are those of Hamas. They commit double war crimes: they hide behind civilians, attack from civilian areas and break all existing laws of the last hundred years, for victory. So it attacks our immune system, we have to understand that. All the things we believe in - freedom of speech, liberalism, civil society, institutions, all of these, the laws that apply in conflict situations, all of these are under attack by Hamas and Iran. So in this way they want to defeat not only Israel, but also the civilized world," the diplomat says.The diplomat was then asked about the biased media and why no foreign journalsits report from Gaza. Reuven Azar asnwered that "There are journalists in Gaza, but there are people who live there. They are not foreign correspondents."As for the way Israel reports to the West Bank, after the Gaza conflict broke out, the ambassador said "There was concern that what happened on October 7 could replicate in the West Bank. This is first of all. Secondly, those who live in the West Bank, the Palestinian Authority, have begun to support Hamas' attacks on Israel, and unfortunately, according to polls, Hamas is very popular. And this makes us wonder what perspective we have for peace in the context in which the Palestinians have intentions of genocide against Israel. In the past we have had proposals for peace, proposals for a Palestinian state, but I deeply doubt that in this situation we would be willing, Israel would be willing to withdraw from the Palestinian cities and risk an attack again. We have passed a resolution in Parliament, voted by 80 members, against a Palestinian state. At least at this point, because we don't want a Hamas-controlled Palestinian state."Regarding the bilateral economic relationship, in particular the military cooperation, the Israeli ambassador said that "It is up to the Romanian Government to decide which model it wants to use to procure the things Romania needs. So far I have not seen a G2G formula, but I have seen a series of tenders of the Romanian Army in which Israeli companies presented their offer, with the hope of winning a part of them. We have good proposals, we are formidable competition and we have the advantage that no other country has. Not only that our equipment has proven its qualities in a conflict situation, but we are prepared for a collaborative production, here in Romania. (...) If we win the tender for short and medium range anti-missile systems, we will make them in Romania. If we win the bid for the satellites, we will build them, at least partially, here. Israeli companies are interested in opening factories here not just to do someone a favour. We are talking about a common interest. If we have factories in common with Romania, in this country, we will be able to sell to NATO countries, after the allied programme for strengthening capabilities is finalised. We are currently a very important partner for Europe in terms of providing defense systems. Even the countries that criticize us continue to buy from us."Ambassador Azar also spoke about the projects in agriculture, namely in terms of irrigation, in terms of harvesting technology. "In Romania there are many large or medium-sized farms that buy these technologies, so they have developed on a global scale. Multinational companies have acquired them, (...) it is an Israeli business, but we are talking about an international effort. In addition, we started a very interesting pilot project with the mayor of Buzau, Constantin Toma, irrigation with purified water. It is at an early stage. In Israel we irrigate 70% of crops with purified water. It is water from the sewage system, which has been purified. It is a technology that allows (the use, ed. n.) in big cities of huge amounts of canal water that you purify, because, for example, you don't want to contaminate the rivers."Last but not least, the ambassador recalled the matter of the Holocaust Remembrance Museum, saying that "For the first time, Romanians will have the opportunity to see the huge heritage of hundreds of years, which the Jewish community has left here, and it will also be an opportunity for education related to the horrors of the Holocaust and how to avoid the repetition of history."