'A Jewish Gov't for a Jewish State': 1,500 Protest Against Arabs in the Coalition

About 1,500 people gathered at Habima Square in Tel Aviv on Tuesday night to protest the governing coalition’s partnership with the United Arab List, under the slogan “A Jewish government for a Jewish state.”

Speaking to the crowd, Likud MK Amir Ohana said: “How good it is to see you rise up against the greatest theft of democracy in Israel’s history.”

“They have joined the justice system and the media [in order to] bring down a sitting prime minister. They did this by massively tarnishing Netanyahu. Their belief is black and their flags are black,” he said.

Fellow Likud MK Eli Cohen, who also spoke at the demonstration, said Israel was “in danger of becoming a state of all its citizens. In all the Arab countries they’re working to outlaw the Muslim Brotherhood – and here they determine what happens in the Bennett government.”

Some of the protesters called MK Mansour Abbas of Ra'am a terrorist, including MK Itamar Ben-Gvir of Religious Zionism. The far-right lawmaker said that "we want a Jewish and democratic state here, we want a government without terrorists, we want a full-fledged right-wing government."

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Rabbi Yehoshua Shapira, the head of the Ramat Gan hesder yeshiva said at the protest: “Today the Jewish people have no government - we have a Jewish state and a government of all its citizens, a government that uses non-Jews to force its will on us.”

Prof. Talia Einhorn, who took part in the demonstration, said: “The people of Israel deserves a justice system that does not frame people. The matters that come up in Case 4000 must be very disturbing to anyone to whom the law is important,” she said, referring to the alleged regulatory favors to the media in return for favorable coverage case against former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu posted a clip Saturday night calling on right-wing supporters to take part in the demonstration, but did not say he would be there.

Another protester, who identified himself as Ofir from Yavne, said: “We came to strengthen the state. The haters of Israel are in the coalition, and people once considered right—wing are cooperating with them. They are abandoning every Jewish characteristic in the country.”