Fox News must apologize to its viewers, a White House spokesperson said, after the rightwing channel’s host Jesse Watters seemed to advocate violence against Arab Americans, amid heightened tensions over the Israel and Hamas war in Gaza.
On Wednesday evening, on the highly rated Fox show The Five, Watters said: “If you’re an Arab American in this country, and you rip down posters of Jewish hostages, American hostages, no. No, no, no. Someone is going to get punched in the face.”
In a statement sent to the Guardian, the White House deputy press secretary, Andrew Bates, called Watters’ remarks “unacceptable” and said: “Fox News owes an apology to every single viewer for this sickening attack on the rights and dignity of their fellow Americans.”
Israel says more than 1,400 people were killed and more than 5,400 injured when Hamas launched surprise attacks on 7 October. More than 240 hostages were taken. According to the Gaza health ministry Israeli strikes have killed more than 9,000. The same source says nearly 24,000 Palestinians have been injured.
In the US, amid protest and counter-protest, instances of posters of hostages taken by Hamas being removed from public display have been widely reported.
On Wednesday, Watters also said: “I want to say something about Arab Americans and about the Muslim world. We – and when I say we I mean the west and western technology – have created the Middle East. We made them rich. We got that oil out of the ground, our military protects all of these oil shipments flying around the world, making them rich. We fund their military. We respect their kings. We kill their terrorists. OK? But we’ve had it. We’ve had it with them!”
Bates said: “These hateful lies about ‘Arab Americans and … the Muslim world’ highlight the urgency of President Biden’s work to ensure hate has no safe harbor in America, and why he committed to the first national anti-Islamophobia strategy in our history.”
Bates also pointed to a killing in Plainfield, Illinois, in which Wadea Al-Fayoume, aged six, was stabbed to death in an attack his mother survived. The family’s landlord has been charged with murder and a hate crime. Prosecutors said the accused, who has pleaded not guilty, “listen[ed] to conservative talk radio on a regular basis”, “hated Muslims” and was obsessed with the Israel-Hamas war.
A family friend said the attacker shouted “you Muslims have to die” and “you are killing our kids in Israel. You Palestinians don’t deserve to live.”
Bates said Watters’ “ … unacceptable remarks come just weeks after the heartbreaking killing of a six-year-old Palestinian American child, and during a spike in threats against Muslim and Arab Americans.
“Fox News owes an apology to every single viewer for this sickening attack on the rights and dignity of their fellow Americans. President Biden will always stand up against Islamophobia, antisemitism and all forms of hate. Fox News should learn from his example.”
Fox News did not immediately return a request for comment.
