NAZARETH // Six Arab members of the Israeli parliament returned
last week from a visit to Libya at the personal invitation of its leader,
Muammer Qadafi, to a storm of protest in Israel, including threats to prosecute
them and bar them from standing in future elections.
The delegation of 39 public figures from Israel’s Arab minority,
who were flown to Tripoli on Mr Qadafi’s private plane last weekend, had
requested the visit in the hope of breaking their isolation in the Arab world.
The invitation had special importance for Israel’s Arab leaders
because Libya, which hosted the Arab League summit last month, is seen as their
gateway to the other Arab countries, which have traditionally regarded dealings
with any Israelis, including one-fifth of the population who are Palestinian
Arabs, as “normalisation”.
Last week, however, the Israeli parliament erupted into angry
exchanges as the Arab MPs returned to work, with right-wing legislators accusing
them of “treason”. In an unprecedented incident, one Arab MP was forcibly
removed from the podium by guards as he talked about the trip.
A committee of MPs is due to consider stripping the Arab
legislators of their parliamentary immunity, possibly leaving the way open for
their prosecution for visiting an “enemy state”.
The latest debacle adds to the besieged status of the 10 MPs
belonging to Arab parties, who say they are facing a campaign of persecution
since the right-wing government of Benjamin Netanyahu came to power a year ago.
“Israel forced us into a political and cultural ghetto for
decades and is targeting us because we are breaking out of this abnormal
situation by engaging with the Arab nation to which we belong,” said Haneen
Zoubi, one of the MPs in the delegation.
The three-day visit to Libya was made possible after months of
negotiations between Israel’s Arab leaders and Mohammed al Barghouti, Libya’s
ambassador to Jordan. The delegation flew from the Jordanian capital, Amman, to
Tripoli on April 24 without their Israeli passports being stamped or receiving a
visa.
They were later hosted by Mr Qadafi in Sirte, his hometown and
the venue of the Arab League summit.
Calling them “Arabs of ’48” – a reference to the fact that they
were part of the Palestinian people until Israel’s creation in 1948 – Mr Qadafi
told the delegation last Sunday that they had been invited because “I want the
world to hear you”.
In comments widely reported in the Israeli media, the Libyan
leader warned that Israel’s actions were pushing it “to the edge of the
precipice” and that the West’s pursuit of a two-state solution, as opposed to a
single binational state, was “stupid and unrealistic”.
He added that the Arab minority should concentrate on having more
babies to defeat Zionism, arguing that a “human explosion is stronger than
nuclear weapons”, in a remark that accentuated widely held fears among Israel’s
Jewish majority that Arab citizens are a demographic “ticking time bomb” that
could end the state’s Jewishness.
Most of the delegation spoke at the meeting in favour of Israel’s
reform into a state representing “all its citizens” rather than just the Jewish
majority.
Mr Qadafi was also reported to have agreed to consider a request
to open Libya’s colleges to Israel’s Arab students, who face major obstacles to
studying inside the country. Many already study in Jordan, which along with
Egypt has signed a peace agreement with Israel.
Jamal Zahalka, one of the six MPs, said that the meeting had been
a breakthrough for the minority. “He told us that it was very important our
voice is heard in the Arab world, that we remain in our homeland despite the
threats against us, and that he would do everything in his power to help.”
The Libyan leader, Mr Zahalka added, had agreed to discuss with
the Arab League assigning Israel’s Arab minority an observer status at its
meetings.
The delegation’s warm welcome in Libya contrasted strongly with
the opprobrium that greeted the Arab MPs on their appearance in the Israeli
parliament on Wednesday.
Israeli Arab leaders have avoided trips to most Arab states since
a law was passed in 2008 granting officials the power to bar individuals and
parties who have visited an enemy state from running for election.
One MP, Saed Nafa, who was not in the delegation, is facing
prosecution over a trip he made to Syria as part of a Druze group in 2007.
Mr Zahalka said they had received legal advice before the trip
that Libya was not included in an emergency regulation listing “enemy states”,
which reportedly include Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Yemen.
However, Yaffa Zilbershats, a professor of constitutional law at
Bar Ilan University, near Tel Aviv, told the Jerusalem Post newspaper that Libya
was listed in an annex to the regulation.
The parliament’s house committee is to meet today to consider
stripping the MPs of their immunity in a move that would make them vulnerable to
prosecution for the trip. “What we have here is an historic opportunity to
abolish once and for all the immunity and rights of [parliament] members who
hate Israel and denigrate the state,” said Michael Ben Ari, a far-right
legislator.
Ahmed Tibi, who was removed from the parliament’s podium as he
spoke about the trip, called the immunity hearing “a bizarre and crazy debate in
keeping with the atmosphere of persecution that emerges here time and again”.
Ms Zoubi said the true goal of the furore was to make it more
difficult for Arab parties to run in the next general election.
In the last national election, a special committee comprising the
main Zionist parties disqualified all the Arab parties from running, although
its decision was overturned by the courts. “The talk of our breaking the law in
visiting Libya is designed to turn the courts against us,” she said.
The six MPs are also facing an investigation by the ethics
committee after Reuven Rivlin, the parliamentary speaker, claimed that they had
violated rules about disclosing funding from private sources in accepting a
flight on Mr Qadafi’s plane.
A poll published last month showed that 56 per cent of Israeli
Jewish youth believe leaders of the country’s Arab minority should not be
allowed to stand for election.
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