ISLAMABAD – Defence Minister Khawaja Asif on Friday ‘unleashed’ direct threats at Israel over a hoax news piece published on a news website.
“Israeli def min threatens nuclear retaliation presuming pak role in Syria against Daesh. Israel forgets Pakistan is a Nuclear state too,” Khawaja Asif tweeted.
The defence minister’s tweet was in a response to a news item published on a website awdnews.com on Dec 20, subtly threatened Israel of a nuclear attack.
https://twitter.com/KhawajaMAsif/status/812370140507545600
The Israeli Defence Ministry too replied to the Pakistani minister.
https://twitter.com/Israel_MOD/status/812662633686069248
Mr Asif did not respond to the Israelis on Twitter, and as of Saturday, his message had been reposted nearly 400 times. Many of the people reacting to Mr Asif on Twitter mocked him for his mistake.
This created a stir in the media and social media and has been in debate since then.
A top New Zealand news website www.stuff.co.nz reported: Pakistani minister directs nuclear threat at Israel after reading fake news
https://twitter.com/tanvirarain/status/812644308931276800
The Israeli media too reported the matter. Major daily Haaretz commented that a false news article making the rounds on social media could potentially have had a devastating result: nuclear war.
Israel Radio said on Saturday that Asif was responding to a fake news story on the website AWDnews.com, which falsely reported that Israel responded to a Pakistani promise to send troops to Syria with a threat of nuclear attack.
