Israel’s new Attorney General Dr. Avichai Mandelblit on Sunday ordered the police Investigations and Intelligence Division to collect the factual information available at this point for his consideration, the Justice Ministry announced. The move came following a conversation between the AG and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Saturday night, when the latter requested weighing legal steps against Israeli-Arab MKs Hanin Zoabi, Jamal Zahalka and Basel Ghattas of the Joint Arab List, who met last Tuesday with the families of Palestinian Authority terrorists.
Netanyahu told his cabinet ministers Sunday that he believes the three MKs do not represent the Arab public and that they are “building walls of hatred.” He also said he had requested new legislation to prevent such events from taking place in the future, which was followed by a decision by the heads of the coalition factions to enable the Knesset plenum to suspend an MK for inappropriate behavior with a 90-member majority vote.
The Tuesday visit, at an unknown location, by MKs Hanin Zoabi, Basel Ghattas and Jamal Zahalka from the United Arab list, began with a moment of silence and a prayer for the souls of the terrorists who have murdered Israelis over the past few months and whose bodies have not yet been returned by the Israeli government. The families stressed the importance of being able to bury their loved ones, and protested the manner in which they had been “executed.” The Arab MKs for their part promised to apply as much pressure as they can to bring the bodies home, emphasizing that not releasing them is “a sin.”
The Arab MKs also met with the father of Bahaa Alyan, the terrorist who committed the stabbing and shooting attack in Armon Hanatziv in Jerusalem last October, killing three Jews. They reportedly met with other terrorists from eastern Jerusalem as well.
All three MKs congratulated the family members for their firm stand. “It’s important to be united against the attacks on the Palestinian nation,” they said. The Arab party meanwhile has passed the families’ request to Internal Security Minister Gilad Erdan.
Erdan was enraged by the MKs’ message and called on the Attorney General to examine whether their meeting with the families of terrorists might not constitute a criminal support for acts of murder and terror. “The bodies of the terrorists will not be released until the families commit to obeying police requirement that the funerals not turn into a riot of incitement and support for terrorism. Instead of promoting [the police request] the Arab MKs did the exact opposite,” Erdan said.
Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely (Likud) said that “the Arab MKs don’t miss an opportunity to support terrorism. They harm their own constituents more than anyone else, they represent nothing and promote nothing other than support for terrorism an action against the State of Israel. The Arab public should oppose its representatives who act as agents for terrorism instead of its representatives in the Knesset.”
Chairman of the Constitutional Committee, MK Nissan Slomiansky (Bayit Yehudi) said that “It appears that in Israel’s Knesset there are supporters of terrorism. We must change the election laws so that anyone whose behavior is immoral and harms the State of Israel would not sit in the Israeli Knesset.”
Ayelet Nahmias-Verbin (Zionist Camp) said the Arab MKs are severing with their own hands the last threads that still connect them to Israeli society. “We cannot ignore it when MKs are visiting the families of terrorists who injured and murdered Israelis,” she said, adding, “Instead of using their position to bridge the gaps, they are digging with their own hands an ever-deepening ditch of hatred.”