EXCLUSIVE: Israel’s National Security Minister Responds To Bottle-Throwing Yale Crowd

Moments after protesters near Yale University hurled invective and bottles at him, Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir sat down with The Daily Wire to discuss why he refuses to be silenced by his critics.

“If I wasn’t so influential they wouldn’t have cared,” Ben-Gvir said. “They think they can use violence to defeat us. They will not defeat us. They will not win. Their violence will not win.”

Ben-Gvir is a boogeyman to the Israeli Left and Western media due to his extremely hawkish, right-wing views. While much criticism targets his controversial past, his hardline stances also receive scrutiny, including his proposal this week to bomb food storage facilities in Gaza to pressure the terror group to release the 59 remaining hostages.

Before his arrival at an event close to Yale on Wednesday night, about 300 students and local activists gathered to demonstrate against his presence. Chants such as “Ben-Gvir will fall” and “intifada, intifada” were shouted throughout the night.

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As students arrived, they were shouted at and booed by the angry mob, and when they left, some had water bottles thrown at them.

Despite the uproar, Ben-Gvir said he enjoyed spending time with the students.

“I really really enjoyed it here at the end, even though someone threw bottles at me,” the Israeli government official said. “It doesn’t scare me. I am saying my truth and I will walk with my truth. I will keep saying it and I will fight for it.”

The day before, Ben-Gvir was at Mar-a-Lago, where he was welcomed by applause from a crowd filled with Trump allies and members of Congress. He said that the reception likely wouldn’t have happened if President Donald Trump had lost because he was detested by the Biden administration.

“It would have been likely that they would not admit me and here I am today, from a situation where I was a persona-non-grata, to a situation where I am being loved,” he said. “I enter their room and there is an applause for what I say, on our ideas, on our world view, on the fact that I want a big and strong state of Israel.”

Ben-Gvir said he believes the protesters are angry at him for several changes he made in Israel regarding firearm carrying, prison reform, and non-Muslim prayer on the Temple Mount, in addition to the Gaza conflict.

“I made reform in gun carrying laws in Israel. Before I came into office there were 8,000 gun licenses and after I came there were 200,000. And it works, it works, Jewish lives are being saved,” he said. “In the jails of Israel there was a complete summer camp, marmalades and chocolates and pitas and endless outdoor walks around the yard and there was no governance. I changed that, I stopped the summer camps, I took everything from them: the radio, the TVs, the education.”

Ben-Gvir, who is frequently criticized for advocating for Jews to be allowed to pray on the Temple Mount, said he helped change the status quo that forbade Jewish prayer.

“I made many, many changes,” he said. “That is why they are so angry at me and that’s why Hamas tried to assassinate me five times. And what does it say? I stand with my truths with my world view, and I really know we are right, and this is why we will win.”

While Ben-Gvir labels himself as a free speech advocate, he said the protesters outside his event were not engaged in free speech.

“Throwing bottles at me, trying to physically hurt me,” he said. “That is no freedom of speech. They want to intimidate, they want to shut people down.”

He added that he supports Trump’s plan to deport foreign students who are supporters of terrorists.

“I fully support Trump’s policy on U.S. universities,” he said. “I hope it will bring change because, in many places, the universities have turned into grounds for terrorism and support for terrorism. Who do they support? Child murderers? Women murderers?”

​Ben-Gvir was invited to speak at Shabtai, founded in 1996 as a Jewish alternative to other Ivy League intellectual discussion societies, though it is not officially affiliated with the university. Non-Jews are also invited, with prominent figures such as Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ) and former presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy among the ranks of affiliates.

Ben-Gvir, who hasn’t traveled to the United States since he was a child, said he came at his son’s urging.

“My son was here in Miami, he was a bit in New York several months ago, he told me ‘dad, you must come, you must come,’” Ben-Gvir recalled. “First of all the people: they are such good people. Good people. They love the country … and the things I encountered, I felt great love, great embrace.”

When asked why Americans should support Israel, Ben-Gvir said that the Jewish state is helping fight America’s enemies.

“I think Israel also fights America’s war — our war is not just for Israel,” he said. “Understand, those Hamas folk, my neighbors in Hebron, they don’t want only Hebron. They want Jerusalem, Acre, Haifa and Jaffa. If you question them a bit further, they tell you that their end goal is the entire world. Everywhere there would be caliphates. Everything will be Hamas.”

Ben-Gvir added that he is enjoying the close relationship with the Trump administration and hopes that the president follows through with his plans to take over Gaza and relocate Gazans.

“Trump has an excellent plan,” he said. “It is correct, it is right and it is ethical.”