Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia – Israel’s head of Homeland Security issued a rare warning on Saturday (05/06/2021) about the possibility of violence on the verge of ousting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, its longest-serving leader. This could be one of the most politically charged periods of recent decades.
Netanyahu faces the prospect of ending his 12-year term as prime minister after Israel’s center opposition leader Yair Lapid announced on Wednesday (03/06/2021) that he had successfully formed a governing coalition following the March 23 election.
The new government, which has not yet been sworn in, is a coalition of small and medium-sized parties from across the political spectrum and for the first time in Israel’s history an Arab Islamist party, representing 21% of Israel’s Arab minority.
Citing Reuters, Netanyahu in the post online has warned the partnership is a “dangerous leftist government.”
Some right-wing groups angry at Naftali Bennett, the head of the small ultra-nationalist party slated to replace Netanyahu in a power-sharing pact with Lapid, garnered numerous offensive posts of him on social media.
Prior to the election, Bennett had promised not to join the centrist Lapid, or any Arab party in the coalition.
“We have recently identified an increase in discourse of violence and incitement that is becoming increasingly extreme especially on social networks,” Nadav Argaman, head of the Shin Bet Security Force, said in an unnamed statement. ).
“This discourse can be interpreted among certain groups or individuals, as one that permits violent and illegal activities that can even cause physical harm,” he said.
Since Bennett announced he was joining Lapid, the security services have stepped up their protections with far-right demonstrations held near the homes of his party members, hoping they won’t join the government.
Argaman called on political and religious leaders to show responsibility and curb potential incitement. His warning reminded some in Israel of the days leading up to the 1995 assassination of prime minister Yitzhak Rabin, who was shot by a Jewish ultra-nationalist for pursuing a land deal for peace with the Palestinians.
Israeli leftists have for years accused Netanyahu, then head of the opposition, of playing a role in the incitement that preceded the assassination. Netanyahu vehemently denied the allegations and repeatedly condemned Rabin’s murder.
Lapid and Bennett said they hoped their “unity government” would heal deep political divisions among Israelis and end hatred. A poll by Israeli television N12’s Meet the Press on Saturday showed that 46% of Israelis support the Bennett-Lapid government, 38% will vote for another election – their fifth in about two years – and 15% have expressed no preference.
Tensions could flare further this week, when a far-right Jewish march is expected to pass through Jerusalem’s Old City’s Damascus gates. Eleven days of fierce fighting broke out last month between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, sparked by Israeli-Palestinian confrontations in Jerusalem, in and around the Old City. A similar march, routed at the last minute, was held on the day the fighting broke out.
In the nearby East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah, where the potential expulsion of Palestinians by Jewish settlers played a major role in the latest escalation of the Israel-Hamas conflict, clashes broke out on Saturday.
Media network Al Jazeera said one of its journalists, Givara Budeiri, had been attacked and arrested by Israeli police while covering the protests there.
(wia)
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