The ‘Good Stories Happen All the Time, but No One Hears About It’: Outgoing IDF Spokesman

The international spokesperson for the Israel Defense Forces faces the toughest of audiences, under the most blinding of global spotlights. As the public face of an institution feared and despised by millions around the world, his every word is scrutinized by the international media — especially since October 7, when Israel came under intense global military, political, and diplomatic pressure.The New York Sun recently sat down for a wide-ranging exit interview with Israeli Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani, who stepped down last week after two years as the public face of the IDF. Excerpts from that conversation, adapted for length and clarity, follow below.New York Sun: Looking back on your time as spokesperson, what would you like to have improved?Nadav Shoshani: Two things: The first is to get to the bottom of things faster. Not just answering faster — because if information isn’t correct, I’m gonna lose my credibility — but to work with commanders in the field to get the information faster. Every minute is important. Every single week in this position I’ve seen fake news about Israel. So we have to fight that faster and better. The second thing is that we still have a way to go to social media and work with different outlets and influencers and things that are not just traditional media in a more active way. We have to monitor it and see what the new trends are. There is a social media battlefield and public opinion battlefield. Our enemies can just throw something out there. If it’s true or not, they don’t even care. There have been even cases where someone has lied and I exposed it, but the lie got more exposure than the truth.On 7 October, 2023 Israel shut the borders with Gaza. Since then, journalists have not been allowed to enter freely. The only way is to go on an IDF embed. Do you understand why international journalists are extremely frustrated about that?I would like international reporters to have access. I’ve said that internally. I believe in access for journalists. I think we were suffering a lot from the fact that reporters don’t have access. But when it comes to free access to Gaza, it’s a larger issue than the idea of a spokesperson unit. There are security concerns, and at the end of the day, it’s a government decision.Part of your work is also to either defend or to explain certain actions by the IDF, which, from time to time, are obviously unacceptable. So, for example, when the story about Israel killing 15 medics driving in ambulances in the middle of the night broke — do you understand why some people loathe Israel? When you are fighting on seven different fronts for a long time, things that shouldn’t happen are bound to happen. The question is, how do you deal with it? Professional armies that have Western values deal with it with a strict hand and use it as an opportunity to set the record straight and to make sure that the relevant people are reprimanded, that the incident is investigated and taken care of. And that’s what I’ve seen happen in these types of cases. When a soldier disrespected a statue of Jesus [in South Lebanon], the IDF immediately acknowledged it was wrong and sent the [two offending] soldiers to jail and removed them from their positions. About 99% of the time things go the way they’re supposed to. Just this week, soldiers were operating against Hezbollah terrorists who were firing at them from a specific area. They were about to operate in the area but understood it was a religious site so they stopped operating. These types of stories, the good stories, happen all the time, but no one hears about it. The bad stories, everyone hears about.What is your response to the accusations by various countries and human rights groups that Israel is committing genocide?The NGOs, and even the U.N., have a serious problem with being accurate and impartial. They think that throwing slander at Israel would make them popular and that it will pressure Israel to end the war, which is not their job and is a huge mistakeI often see them posting something that slanders Israel, and in the comment section they tell you how you can contribute to them. It’s a way for them to get attention and to raise funds. I think it’s completely cynical. And if we’re talking of the facts on the ground, the ratio between combatants and civilians [killed in the conflict] has been better than most urban wars in history. I don’t think any military in the world has operated in such a complex arena like Gaza. No other military in history has taken the steps to prevent harm to civilians like Israel has. And no other terror organization has taken the steps to make it complex and put their civilians in harm’s way like Hamas. Any army or military expert that comes to Israel and sees our operations — all of them told me, ‘The way you are operating is of a higher standard than the way we operate.’ But the civilians or even the political leaders in those countries say that Israel is conducting a genocide because they either have no idea what they’re talking about, or they’re trying to get cheap popularity points.During your two years in your role you got to make huge and historic announcements, both good and bad. Which one sticks out to you? The six hostages in Rafah that were executed by Hamas. That was a difficult announcement to make, emotionally, on a personal and national level. What story were you happy to announce?The killing of [Iranian Supreme Leader] Ali Khamenei. When I entered the position two years ago, Israel was still still gathering itself and regrouping from what happened on October 7. We were dealing with one of the tentacles of the octopus, Hamas. Then two years later, to be able to have given a significant blow to all the tentacles, and top that off with eliminating the head of the Iranian octopus — for us, that was a very special moment.”Did you have any fears about saying yes to this role in April 2024? And are you worried about the repercussions in terms of security when you travel abroad now as a civilian? No, because I have friends and family who are on the battlefield. I might be risking my name, or I might be risking my face being known around the world, or I might be risking persecution — but my friends and family are risking their lives. Personally, I’ve seen people lose their lives on the battlefield. So it puts into perspective what I’m doing. My main concern was: Could I do this job in a way that would serve my country well or not? Am I the right man for the position? I did my best to protect my family, so I didn’t really share anything about them, such as their names and faces. We are seeing a global legal warfare against Israel, but there’s also diplomatic persecution and personal persecutions. Our enemies want to terrorize Israeli soldiers, threatening them that wherever they go they will be persecuted. So as someone who’s been high-profile, I understand that I am part of it.

The ‘Good Stories Happen All the Time, but No One Hears About It’: Outgoing IDF Spokesman

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