An interesting phenomenon has been noticed about Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s recent speeches and media posts about the coronavirus – an avoidance of the word “COVID” replaced by the word “Delta.”

For example, Bennett published a long Facebook post on Motzei Shabbos outlining his strategy to fight the alarming surge in coronavirus cases. He began the post by writing: “I would like to share our national plan to deal with the ‘Delta wave’ sweeping the world. Later, he wrote.”I’ll explain here about the outbreak of the ‘Delta variant’ in the world and Israel,” and…”During the ‘Delta,’ we’ll try to avoid a lockdown… If Israeli citizens wear masks and get vaccinated, we’ll defeat the ‘Delta.'”

A Yediot Achranot reporter actually went through the post and counted how many times Bennett mentioned the word “Delta” (7) in the post versus COVID (2).

In his speeches, Bennett also emphasizes the word “Delta” and even once corrected himself after mistakenly saying COVID, switching to the word ‘Delta.’ Health Minister Nitzan Horowitz has also been using the word “Delta’ instead of COVID.

Political analysts say that Bennett has been advised to use the word ‘Delta’ rather than COVID to insinuate that he is dealing with a brand new virus in order to justify the fact that despite the fact that COVID was at an all-time low when he entered office, he is now facing a coronavirus crisis. By using the word ‘Delta,’ he is trying to influence public opinion to view the Delta variant as an entirely new phenomenon.

This shift is especially important for Bennett, who has been facing flak for the severe criticism he directed at Netanyahu over the COVID crisis during the previous government as well as the book he authored: ‘How to Beat COVID-19: The Way to Overcome the Crisis and Lead Israel to Economic Prosperity,’ in which he outlined a plan to beat COVID within five weeks.

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)