The Likud party, led by Benjamin Netanyahu, appealed on Wednesday to Israel’s Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara demanding that she launch a comprehensive investigation into allegations that the Palestinian Authority (PA) was actively interfering in the Israeli elections, slated for November.
The Israeli media reported that the heads of the Arab-majority Joint List party, Members of Knesset (MK) Ayman Odeh, Ahmed Tibi, and Sami Abu-Shahadeh secretly met in Ramallah with Majd Faraj, the head of PA’s intelligence, with the aim of influencing the results the elections in Israel. Some of the accused MKs deny the report.
According to the reports, Faraj, a close associate of PA head Mahmoud Abbas, met with the Arab MKs twice, reportedly pushing to have the Islamic Ra’am party rejoin the Joint List to prevent Benjamin Netanyahu from winning the elections and in an attempt to interfere in the elections in favor of the bloc led by Yair Lapid and Benny Ganz.
The Likud’s petition, submitted to the Central Election Committee, stated that “a sovereign state cannot afford the external interference of a foreign and hostile entity in the election process for the Knesset.”
“If the Palestinian Authority succeeds in its plot to influence the election results and establish a government that will be supported by Ra’am and the Joint List, the Israeli reality will change beyond recognition,” the Likud warned.
“We are concerned with foreign intervention under serious and dangerous circumstances. The heads of the Joint List met with the head of intelligence in the PA, an external party that is foreign and hostile, about shaping the way the Arab-Israeli public votes in the elections to the Israeli Knesset, in order to influence the composition of the government that will be formed in Israel. If the plan of these talks and the moves discussed in them do not amount to serious interference with the regular course of the elections in Israel – we do not know what a serious interference is,” the petition said.
Earlier this week, MK Avi Maoz sent a letter to Shin Bet head Ronen Bar requesting he launch a comprehensive investigation into the “improper interference in the election system in the State of Israel.”
“Beyond making contact with a hostile party, this is an attempt to interfere illegally in the Israeli election system, and therefore I call for an urgent investigation and drawing of conclusions,” he demanded.
