Former MK Calls For ‘100,000 Palestinians to Encircle A Settlement And Remove It From The Earth’

JERUSALEM (VINnews) — Israeli Arab politician Dr. Jamal Zahalka, a former head of the Balad faction of the Joint Arab list , made some shocking and inciteful statements in an interview on the Kan Reshet Bet radio channel, calling on Palestinians in Judea and Samaria to initiate a struggle against the “occupation.”

Zahalka said that “actions need to be done to end the Israeli occupation. I mean that there needs to be a civilian uprising including civil disobedience on the West Bank against the occupation. One hundred thousand Palestinians can lay siege to a settlement and remove it from the face of the earth.”

Zahalka explained later that “I wish for a just peace and the end of the occupation. The security coordination (between Israel and the PA, which was renewed Monday) extends the period of the occupation and in the end will lead to bloodshed. There need’s to be a domestic, non-violent struggle to end the occupation. When the Arab world neglects them, the Palestinians need to unite.

“When 100,000 Palestinians will lay siege to a settlement the world will pay attention to their struggle. The Palestinian nation has been burnt enough times and is requesting a fair deal- a Palestinian state in the ’67 borders, but Israel is rejecting this outright. What do you want, a binational state? We aren’t going to disappear.”

In response to Zahalka’s suggestion, MK Ofir Sofer (Yemina) demanded that a criminal investigation be opened against Zahalka on suspicion of incitement. Sofer also demanded that the Knesset act to disentitle Zahalka to his rights as a former Knesset member. Sofer also contacted the attorney-general and acting Police Commissioner and requested that a criminal investigation be immediately initiated against Zahalka for incitement and endangering the lives of the public.

“Jamal Zahalka is continuing in the ways of the renegade spy Bishara (Israeli MK suspected of spying for Hezbollah who fled to Qatar) and calls for a civic struggle claiming that he intends peace. The last civic struggle called by Arab leaders was in October 2000 when thousands of Israeli Arabs threw stones and Molotov cocktails and destroyed everything in their path,” Sofer added.

MK Betzalel Smotrich (Yemina) also demanded a criminal investigation against Zahalka who “called yesterday for violence and terror against settlements and settlers. We have to put a stop to the helplessness of the enforcement system regarding support for terror by Arab Israeli leaders from past and present,” Smotrich said.