Serious traffic jams were recorded Monday morning on Israel’s fast toll highway Rt. 6, near the Niztanei Oz interchange close to Netanya, the result of a demonstration of the Islamic Movement against recent home demolitions in the Bedouin town of Umm el-Hiran in the Negev as well as in nearby Arab Qalansawe. According to Israeli media, dozens of vehicles bearing the Palestinian Authority flag were moving slowly down all three lanes.
Walla cited Israeli motorists who were yelling at traffic police: “Who’s ever heard of such a thing? Police motorcycles are accompanying caravans with Palestinian flags on Israel’s main highway?”
“Instead of police writing them tickets and removing those flags from the vehicles, they are providing them with an entourage,” another driver complained.
On Saturday, Police would not arrest activists of the northern faction of the Islamic movement who organized a rally of an estimated 4,500 in Wadi Ara, on another vital highway connecting Israel’s coastal highway outside Hadera with the inland city of Afula, leading to Tveria and Tsfat. The rally was organized by the faction’s leader Raed Salah who had been recently released from prison.
Hundreds of additional vehicles left Bedouin enclaves Umm al-Hiran and Rahat on their way to Jerusalem to protest government’s refusal to release the body of the Bedouin driver who rammed and killed a policeman last week.