Putin apologizes for Lavrov's remarks on Jews: Israel

By Enes Canli

JERUSALEM (AA) - The Israeli prime minister accepted the Russian president's apology over the foreign minister's remarks on Jews, according to the government on Thursday.

Vladimir Putin and Naftali Bennett had a phone call and discussed Sergey Lavrov's remarks on Jews, the Israeli Government Press office said.

The statement noted that Bennett accepted Putin's apology for Lavrov's statements, and thanked him for explaining his stance on the Jewish people and the memory of the Holocaust.

The two also discussed the evacuation of civilians, including wounded civilians, through a UN and Red Cross humanitarian corridor.

According to Kremlin's statement early Thursday, Putin recalled that some 40% of 6 million Jews that were tortured in ghettos and concentration camps and killed by the Nazis during punitive operations were citizens of the Soviet Union, and conveyed his wishes of health and well-being to veterans living in Israel.

"On the eve of Victory Day in the Great Patriotic War, which is celebrated in Russia and Israel on May 9, Vladimir Putin and Naftali Bennett stressed the special significance of this date for the peoples of both countries, who cherish the historical truth about the events of those years and honor the memory of all the fallen, including the victims of the Holocaust," the statement said.

Bennett, in turn, noted the decisive contribution of the Red Army to victory over Nazism, the statement also noted.

In an interview with an Italian television channel on Sunday, Lavrov had said the fact that Ukraine’s president is Jewish does not contradict Moscow’s claims that it launched an attack to “denazify” the country.

“I believe that Hitler also had Jewish blood,” he added.