Former Secretary of Veterans Affairs Robert Wilkie told Newsmax on Wednesday that Israel has a history of acting in its own interest.

Wilkie’s statement to “American Agenda” came up against a prompt citing a New York Times article that Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu is threatening to derail President Donald Trump’s negotiations with Iran on their nuclear energy program and attack the Middle Eastern country — a claim Netanyahu has said, borrowing from Trump’s expression, is “fake news.”

Wilkie, ostensibly confirming the Times’s reporting, said, “The operative principle for Israeli leaders, really going back to the 1967 war, has been if someone tells you over and over again he wants to kill you, you better believe him.”

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