Israel’s defense minister toughens campaign against Israeli Arabs

Avigdor Lieberman, Israeli Defence Minister

Shlomi Eldar writes in Al Monitor, “Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman has never made any bones about the strong grudge he holds against the Arab members of Israel’s Knesset. He never misses an opportunity to lash out at them, targeting them in every election campaign. His initiative to raise the electoral threshold in order to keep Arab parties out of the legislature, which the Knesset adopted in 2014, resulted in the forced union of the four main Arab political parties.”

“Not only did his plot fail, the elections held the following year made the union known as the Joint List the third-largest Knesset faction. Despite internal disputes and ideological differences that have emerged on occasion, the glue has held. The lawmakers of the Joint List, like their voters, are fully aware of the danger they face should the alliance disintegrate into its constituent parts.”

Ayman Odeh, Head of the Arab Jolint List

“However, Liberman was undeterred in his all-out war against the elected officials of Israel’s 20% Arab minority. On May 20, he set a new record of incitement against the Arab lawmakers. “Every day that [Knesset member Ayman] Odeh and his partners are walking free, cursing police officers is a failure of the law enforcement system,” Liberman tweeted. “Those people belong in prison rather than the Knesset. It’s time for them to pay for their actions.”

“What set him off was the Joint List’s sharp criticism of 19 arrests at a demonstration the previous day in the city of Haifa against the live fire used in recent weeks by Israeli soldiers against Palestinian demonstrators massing along the Gaza-Israel border.” (more…)