RN Breakfast 6 March 2026
Melissa Clarke: The new Israeli ambassador to Australia. Hillel Newman joins me in our Parliament House studios. Ambassador. Welcome to Radio National Breakfast.
Hillel Newman: Thank you. It’s my pleasure to be here, and I wish good morning to Australia.
Melissa Clarke: Thank you very much. Now, can you tell me, from Israel’s perspective, do you have a sense of how long this conflict might last? What is the end game that Israel would like to see achieved, and how quickly do you think that can be arrived at?
Hillel Newman: Well, before we drill down, let me just zoom out a little bit, and let’s look at the big picture. This all begins. This whole conflict begins with the Islamic Revolution in 1979 when the Islamic Revolution took place in Iran. You know, Israel and the West had wonderful relations with Iran before the revolution. After the revolution, Iran called Death to America, Death to Israel, Death to the West. Started, and it was not only rhetoric, but it was also action. They set up their proxy groups like Hamas, Hezbollah and others, and therefore we’re in a situation where we have to defend ourselves. How long it will continue? It will continue as long as we need just to attain the objectives. And you ask, what are the objectives? The objectives are to remove two existential threats. The one existential threat is the nuclear program, which Iran intended to intensify and even deepen underground so that it would not be able to attack it in any way. They’d like, have immunity. The second existential threat are the ballistic missiles, where they intended to stockpile thousands of missiles and launch them all at once against Israel, against different countries, and that would have been an existential threat.
Melissa Clarke: Now, if Israel’s objective is to be able to be in a position where there is no Iran that does not pose a threat to Israeli citizens, and the ongoing existence of the Israeli state, has there been a strategic error here, given we have seen a very full response from Iran attacking across the region, and potentially a new leader installed who may be more bent on revenge than what you currently have?
Hillel Newman: Well, we only wish for a new leadership in Iran, which would not be a warmongering leadership that tries to annihilate the State of Israel, kill the Jews and go against the values of the West. If that will happen, it will be a reshaping, entire reshaping of the Middle East.
Melissa Clarke: If that happens, would that have been a consequence of Israel’s decision to initiate these strikes at the start of the week?
Hillel Newman: Of course, no, we won’t cry if there’s a regime change, although that’s not our declared objective, because we leave it up to the people of Iran. The people of Iran must decide their future. We’re not deciding for them their future. It’s their choice. But we’re trying to remove the fear barrier. The people do want to change. They want to change their regime. They’re oppressed. The gays are hung from cranes. Women are killed just for not covering their hair —
Melissa Clarke: Can I just come back to what I think the stated objective is, which is to ensure the safety of Israeli citizens and the protection of the Israeli state.
Hillel Newman: Not only Israel, if I may just stress, it’s the entire West and Americans. There are thousands of Americans that were killed in different attacks, proxy attacks by Iran.
Melissa Clarke: But we have already seen the proxy groups severely decimated by earlier actions from Israel. We have already had strikes that have hit at Iran’s nuclear facilities, which the US government told us obliterated them. Now we don’t have any suggestion that there is an imminent threat from any desire to increase the nuclear or ballistic missile stockpiles from Iran. So was there really an imminent threat that required a response from Israel and the US at this point in time?
Hillel Newman: Yes, we had intelligence information that indicated clearly they intended to intensify and harm and enhance their nuclear capability —
Melissa Clarke: An intent to intensify doesn’t equal a current, imminent threat though.
Hillel Newman: It’s a long term existential threat. And we have learned from the seventh —
Melissa Clarke: Long term and imminent are very different things, are they not?
Hillel Newman: We have learned from the Seventh of October attack, where the Hamas attacked Israel and 1200 people were killed in one day. We have learned that you don’t measure anymore according to long term intentions. If a person has a capability, or a country, an entity has a capability, of attacking you, you must do whatever is necessary in order to make sure that doesn’t happen. That’s the obligation of any country towards its citizens. You know, there’s a question, the fact that everyone asks, why? why is Israel in America doing it? And for years, we’ve been under attack and it’s the right of any country to defend itself.
Melissa Clarke: You’re listening to Radio National breakfast, where my guest is the Israeli ambassador to Australia, Hillel Newman. Now we have seen the Israeli military confirm that troops have entered southern Lebanon, and that that deployment was made in order to provide an additional layer of defence for people living in northern Israel. How long will that incursion last?
Hillel Newman: Yes, the incursion, I’ll explain the background. Incursion is a result of the fact that the Hezbollah decided to launch rockets. We pre-warned Lebanon and the Hezbollah, and we said, “don’t enter the conflict”. We have no conflict with Lebanon right now. We know that Hezbollah, of course, is a proxy of Iran and serves the interests of Iran, not of the Lebanese people. The president of Lebanon himself has tried to demilitarise the Hezbollah. If that would happen, we might even have peace with Lebanon, but we pre-warned not to go into the conflict. The Hezbollah launched rockets against Israel, and therefore we had to do a kind of incursion in order to remove the distance of the rockets from the people of Israel.
Melissa Clarke: So you say, remove the distance of the rockets. But we’ve heard the finance minister Bezalel Smotrich say that Southern Beirut will resemble the destroyed city of Khan Yunus in Gaza. Now that would evoke pretty strong images for Australians who’ve seen the full level of destruction in Gaza, is that the objective here? To try and achieve wholesale obliteration of parts of southern Lebanon?
Hillel Newman: Not at all. You know, Israel is robust democracy, with many views viewed and voiced. It doesn’t mean that that’s policy —
Melissa Clarke: This is the Finance Minister, this is a senior cabinet member.
Hillel Newman: He represents his party, and he’s got his jurisdiction and his people. I’m saying you must look at the policy. And the policy is not to obliterate Lebanon —
Melissa Clarke: So we should not ignore the minister? Focus on the —
Hillel Newman: What he says is not policy. Policy is what the government, the cabinet, cabinet of Israel, decides. And the policy right now is to do an incursion in order to just make sure that the distance of rockets being launched by the Hezbollah against Israel will be such that will have minimum damage. You know, people in Israel have to run to bomb shelters within 15 seconds, otherwise their life is in jeopardy. Just imagine, you know, Australia. Imagine if they had an entity that was calling for their destruction and then launching rockets against them, where they had to run to a bomb shelter within 15 seconds. That’s our reality.
Melissa Clarke: I also want to ask about one of the events from early on in this week’s conflict, and that was the school that was struck in Iran that saw more than 160 people died, presumably, many of them children being in elementary school. What is being done to make sure that there aren’t more civilian deaths like this in this conflict. Surely hitting a school with all of the advancement of our technology and information intelligence that we have, surely that should be able to be avoided?
Hillel Newman: Well, the school incident has not been authenticated. One cannot believe pictures or even photos or words that come out of Iran. What I would like to say is that there’s a clear distinction between the activity in operation of the United States and Israel, which is a joint operation. It’s not an Israeli operation. A joint is US-Israel operation. There’s a clear distinction. We target military installations.
Melissa Clarke: But you can’t tell me that wasn’t as a result of Israeli or US strikes. You’re saying it’s not confirmed, but you’re also not denying that that could happen.
Hillel Newman: I’ll come to the school. I’m just saying in general, we should know that Israel and the United States target military installations, whereas, in total contrast to that, you see how Iran is just hitting out at population, at civil, densely, populated areas, and they are now attacking more than 10 countries in the region….
Melissa Clarke: I find it very hard to believe that you don’t know. Israeli intelligence is clearly incredibly accurate. To be able to have achieved some of the military objectives you have, including the assassinations of leaders of militant groups and terrorist groups, but you don’t know if your country has responsible for dropping a particular bomb on a particular location?
Hillel Newman: That’s the nature of intelligence. You know, you don’t know everything. You don’t know everything about every school or every facility in Iran. You do focus –
Melissa Clarke: You would know the actions of the Israeli defence force.
Hillel Newman: We don’t know and sometimes, you know that’s, that’s part of the problem of Israeli, what they call PR. That it takes us time to get the truth. We don’t say, we don’t spread disinformation and lies, and we don’t just spread things that we think are true. We first check the facts…. So in this case, I can assure you, there was no intention to hit any school. There’s no intention to hit any civilian. There are mistakes that can happen during a war, but we’re not even sure that this is the case. It might even have been Iranian fire that fell short on the school, if it was a school.
Melissa Clarke: All right, Hillel Newman. We are running out of time. But thank you very much for speaking with me on Radio National Breakfast this morning.
Hillel Newman: Thank you.