“This is the right way to cleanse the world of this filth,” wrote Israeli Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu in X, commenting on the assassination of his political leader. Hamas, Ismail Haniyain Tehran.
Your leadership far right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir’s Otzma Yehudit party, Eliyahu, is the first and only senior government official to react to Haniya’s murder, as the Times of Israel writes.
“No more imaginary peace agreements – surrender, no more mercy,” Eligiahu adds in his “enthusiastic” post, arguing that “the iron hand that will strike them is the one that will bring peace and some comfort and strengthen our ability to live in peace with those who seek peace.”
O Israel However, he did not officially comment on Haniya’s death.
“Elijah’s comments came despite Jewish media reports that the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahuordered his ministers to remain silent and not react publicly to the assassination,” writes the Israeli newspaper.
News of Haniya’s death comes hours after Israel confirmed it killed Hezbollah’s Lebanese military chief, Fouad Soukr, in a “surgical” missile strike on Beirut. Sukr was second in command in the military. Hezbollah and a close adviser to the organization’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah.
Israel blamed Shukr for the deaths of 12 children and teenagers in the rocket attack on the Druze town of Maidal Shams in the occupied and annexed Syrian Golan Heights.
An attack attributed to Hezbollah, although the Iran-friendly organization denies it.
“Our response will come and it will be tough,” warned Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, who visited the area of the attack.
Far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich had even called for a war that would destroy Hezbollah and lead to Israel’s reoccupation of southern Lebanon.
Far right the “advantage”
In Israel, the far right has the upper hand, as it effectively controls Netanyahu’s government, constantly inciting attacks against Palestinians.
Last Monday, a far-right mob, along with MPs, stormed a military base where nine soldiers are being held on charges of sexually abusing a Palestinian prisoner, to such an extent that he had to be taken to hospital.
The far-right extremists’ aim was apparently to free the suspects.
National Security Minister Ben Gvir, who feels the same way, is accused of ordering police not to stop the protesters from breaking in, the Times Of Israel reports.
Israeli Defense Minister Gallad went so far as to speak of a “serious threat to the security of the state.”
As Rachel Elior, a professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, puts it: “There are circles among us who want to deny the fact that Palestinians are human beings, just like us, nothing more and nothing less. Many unfortunately believe that we are a holy people and that non-Jews can be defined as impure and worthy of death.”
However, far-right ideas are not only found in religious circles. Ultranationalist and racist views are also widespread in non-religious Israeli society. For example, the Jerusalem football club Beitar Jerusalem is a meeting place for racist and far-right supporters who make no secret of their Islamophobic views. This became clear when the club signed two Muslim players from Chechnya last year. Beitar fans, organised in the ultranationalist fan club “La Familia”, booed the players. But when their rallying cry of “Death to the Arabs” resounds on the pitch, it provokes no reaction.
“Ultras” in the Knesset
Such views are no longer marginal in Israel. They have become socially acceptable. The far-right fringe has moved into the center of the Knesset and into the center of society.
Netanyahu’s sixth government, formed after the parliamentary elections of November 1, 2022, is a coalition made up of six right-wing and far-right parties. This government is considered the most extremist in Israel’s history, with racist, homophobic and misogynistic elements. And it was only through repeated concessions to the far right that Benjamin Netanyahu managed to build a coalition of 64 of the 120 seats in the Knesset to avoid new elections.
The results were immediate: the smaller, more extremist parties received the most important ministerial portfolios, such as the Ministry of National Security for Ben Gvir, who had already been questioned several times by the police for acts considered terrorist.
Ben Gvir directly threatens Netanyahu with overthrowing him if he goes ahead with a ceasefire or the release of Palestinian prisoners who have “blood on their hands.”
“Fifth column”
Racist and far-right extremist statements are now the order of the day in Israel’s parliament, the Knesset.
Likud MP and Transport Minister Miri Regev, 49, for example, is openly committed to fascism. A former army spokeswoman, Regev has called for Arab parties to be banned from the Knesset. She calls them the “fifth phalanx,” and she is not alone.
Likud lawmaker Danny Danon called the Arab lawmakers “masked terrorists” and his party colleague Ofir Akunis said the occupied West Bank belongs only to the Jewish people. Palestinians have no rights there. “This is our country,” he said.
Agelet Saked, a 48-year-old member of parliament and former Justice Minister from the Ha Bajit Hajehudi, Jewish Home, party, is in no way inferior to her Likud colleagues. She recently wrote on her Facebook page that Israel is not waging a war against terrorists, but a war against the Palestinian people. The Palestinians as a whole should be treated as an enemy whose blood must be spilled.
Some draw on ancient, traditional Jewish texts, says Professor Elior. But this does not legitimise the racism they propagate. After all, the Jewish people can look back on a history of more than 3,000 years. Collective memory is shaped by texts, some of which were written when Jews lived as a persecuted minority among other peoples. Many written sources are 3,000 years old, explains Elliott, and it is clear “that during all that time there have existed all kinds of beliefs that are no longer accepted today. Just as we no longer have slaves and maids today, “although there are religious laws that allow it, racist statements based on Israeli sources cannot be allowed”.
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