The secretary of state, John Kerry, on Sunday appeared to criticise Israel’s claims about the targeted scope of its attacks on Gaza, as a open microphone caught him talking to an aide ahead of a TV interview.

“It’s a hell of a pinpoint operation, it’s a hell of a pinpoint operation,” Kerry, who was appearing on Fox News Sunday as part of a tour of all five main US talkshows, said to an aide on the phone, in a frustrated tone.



Earlier, speaking on CNN, the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, said Israel’s response to rocket attacks from Gaza had been “very measured and trying to be as pinpointed as we can”.

“What choice do we have?” Netanyahu said. “We have to protect ourselves. We try to target the rocketeers, we do. And all civilian casualties are not intended by us but actually intended by Hamas who want to pile up as many civilian dead as they can because somebody said they use telegenically dead Palestinians for the cause. They want the more dead the better.”

Kerry's apparent slip came before the White House said President Barack Obama had spoken with Netanyahu on Sunday morning by phone, their second call in three days, and “raised serious concern about the growing number of casualties, including increasing Palestinian civilian deaths in Gaza and the loss of Israeli soldiers”.

The White House said Obama “stressed the need to protect civilians – in Gaza and in Israel”.

Kerry's unscripted remarks about Israeli policy were not the first to have emerged in public. In April, the Daily Beast reported that he had warned a closed-door meeting of world leaders that Israel could become an “apartheid state” if a two-state solution was not found and that if peace talks failed there could be a resumption of Palestinian violence against Israeli citizens.



Israel has launched air strikes, artillery fire and a ground operation in Gaza. According to health officials in the Palestinian territory, 340 people have been killed, nearly 2,400 wounded and tens of thousands displaced in 12 days of fighting.

Ahead of his interview with Fox, Kerry said: “We’ve got to get over there. Thank you, John. I think, John, we ought to go tonight. I think it’s crazy to be sitting around.”



In his interview on CNN's State of the Union, Kerry said Obama would ask him to go to the Middle East soon to aid in efforts to secure a ceasefire.

The Fox host, Chris Wallace, confronted Kerry about his comments and asked if he was implying that the Israeli government had gone too far in its Gaza operations.



Kerry said Israel had a right to defend itself but stood by his comments.



“It’s tough to have these kind of operations. I reacted, obviously, in a way that anybody does with respect to young children and civilians,” Kerry said. “War is tough. I’ve said that publicly and I've said it again. We defend Israel’s right to do what it is doing.

“We support Israel’s right to defend itself against rockets that are continuing to come in. Hamas has started its process of rocketing after Israel was trying to find the people who killed three young [people] – one American kid, three young Israelis.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Smoke rises during what witnesses said was heavy Israeli shelling in Gaza City on Sunday. Photograph: Majdi Fathi/NurPhoto/Corbis

Kerry’s candid comments were in contrast to his more scripted response on ABC’s This Week. On that show, Kerry dismissed claims from Palestinians that the operation in Gaza was a “massacre and a war crime”.

“That's rhetoric that we've heard many, many times,” he said. “What they need to do is stop rocketing Israel and accept the ceasefire.

“It's very, very clear that they've tunneled under Israel. They've tried to come out of those tunnels with people, with handcuffs and tranquilliser drugs to capture Israeli citizens and hold them for ransom, or worse they've been rocketing Israel with thousands of rockets.”

The apparent slip came as the White House said President Obama had spoken to Netanyahu by phone on Sunday morning. It was the two leaders' second call in three days to discuss the situation in Gaza.

Obama reiterated the US’s condemnation of attacks by Hamas against Israel, and his support of Israel’s right to defend itself. But, the White House said, he also “raised serious concern about the growing number of casualties, including increasing Palestinian civilian deaths in Gaza and the loss of Israeli soldiers.”

The White House also said Obama “stressed the need to protect civilians – in Gaza and in Israel”.

Obama informed the Israeli prime minister that Kerry will soon travel to Cairo to seek “an immediate cessation of hostilities based on a return to the November 2012 ceasefire agreement”, and will work closely with Israel and regional partners on implementing an immediate ceasefire.