Israel may label two right-wing groups as terrorists

The time has come to consider designating the far-right Israeli groups La Familia and Lehava as terrorist organisations, the country’s defence minister, Benny Gantz, warned last week.

He was speaking following violence and inflammatory rhetoric at a nationalist Flag March through the Old City’s Muslim Quarter.

The violence and incitement on display at the march through the capital were widely discussed and condemned by the heads of several political parties, but ignored entirely by others, notably the right-wing Likud party and far-right Religious Zionist party.

After meeting with Jerusalem police officers, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, of the right-wing Yamina party, condemned the “group of extremists” behind the violence and said they would be brought to justice.

Foreign minister Yair Lapid, of the centrist Yesh Atid party, said the Jerusalem Day festivities had been hijacked by groups such as La Familia and Lehava.

“Instead of a day of happiness, they tried to make it a day of hate,” the foreign minister said, adding that “these people aren’t patriots”.

Both La Familia and Lehava have been tied to cases of violence against Arabs in Israel over the years.

La Familia is nominally a fan club of Jerusalem’s Beitar football team, although the club has repeatedly distanced itself from it because of its racist rhetoric and violent antics.

Lehava, an organisation against intermarriage and gay people, frequently employs violence, mostly against Arab men.

Its members have also been involved in arson attacks on churches and mixed Arab-Jewish schools, and one member was recently indicted for sexually assaulting an underage female member of the organisation.

Gantz said: “As defence minister, I believe the time has come to consider terrorist organisation designations for groups like La Familia and Lehava.

“I know that the subject has been brought up with security organisations and I trust the heads of the organisations to make that consideration in the cleanest and best way possible.”

The head of Lehava, Bentzi Gopstein, lambasted Gantz’s remarks and said the organisation would survive him.

“‘Defence’ minister Gantz hosts the Holocaust denier and terror supporter Abu Mazen in his home,” Gopstein said in a statement, using the nom de guerre of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.

“And he doesn’t do anything to the Arabs, who are inciting day after day on the Temple Mount, but he does fight the Lehava organisation, which acts for the good of the people of Israel.

“We survived Pharoah, we’ll survive Gantz,” he said.

The defence minister delivered his remarks during his Blue and White party’s faction meeting in the Knesset.

This meeting followed the Jerusalem Day celebrations on 29 May, during which members of both groups were seen attacking Arab residents of the Old City and screaming racist chants such as “Death to Arabs” and “Your vil-lage should burn”, among others.

“In response to those who shout ‘Your village should burn,’ we will strengthen another village and another village.

“We will provide adequate infrastructure and good education, and turn Arab cities and towns in Israel into places where it is good to live.

“This is a national requirement and it also comes from civic fairness,” Gantz said.

Bennett similarly cast the violence by Jewish Israelis as coming from a small minority that he said was not reflective of the whole.

“Other than the group of extremists, whom we will bring to justice, everyone celebrated in a special, uplifting way,” the premier said.

Lapid was somewhat more downbeat, describing the two groups as having hijacked the Flag March and Jerusalem Day.

“We cannot accept that these are the images left at the end of Jerusalem Day. The Israeli majority must take back the Flag March, and Jerusalem, and the State of Israel,” he said. “We are the majority. They are an extremist minority.”

Despite the violence, Bennett said the march through the Muslim Quarter – rather than via a less contentious route – “strength-ened sov-ereignty and governance” in East Jerusalem.

“If we hadn’t done it through the normal route, we would effectively never be able to go back to it. It could have been a withdrawal of sovereignty,” he said. “We proved that the state of Israel acts based on what’s right and not based on threats.”

Those words by Bennett were a reference to threats made by Hamas and other terrorist groups against the march through the Muslim Quarter.

Similar threats were made last year before Hamas launched a number of rockets at Jeru-salem from the Gaza Strip, sparking a nearly two-week war.

In his remarks, Lapid also stressed Israel’s dedication to the status quo on the Temple Mount, specifi cally saying Muslims can visit and pray on the esplanade while Jews may only visit.

“The status quo on the Temple Mount won’t change on our watch,” Lapid said, while acknowledging that “maybe there are people who violate it”.

During the heated Jerusalem Day events, videos circulated of Jews praying and pros-trating themselves on the Temple Mount.

Israeli police removed several of them, though recent court cases have cast doubt on the ability of the police to legally prevent prayer on the site.

• First published by Times Of Israel