Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

WATCH: Lucy Aharish Says Arab Leaders Are ‘Traitors’ On Syria

Israeli Arab newscaster Lucy Aharish had harsh words for Arab world leaders in a new English language broadcast on Israel’s Channel 2 after gas attacks in Syria killed dozens.

“The images that struck us yesterday are not fake news, but old news,” said Aharish, who gave a similar English-language speech castigating world leaders after attacks in Aleppo in December.

Aharish, the first Arab to helm an Israeli newscast in Israel’s history, switched from Hebrew to English in order for her message to spread around the world.

Aharish called out leaders at the recent Arab League summit meeting in Jordan, referring to them as “traitors.”

“Where is the Arab leadership? Where are you, traitors? Have you forgotten your own people?”

“Their blood is screaming in Arabic,” she said of Syrian civilian victims.

Contact Naomi Zeveloff at [email protected] or on Twitter @naomizeveloff

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.