Israeli-Arab MP Tibi: Racism is mainstream “on the Israeli street”
Headline: "Mayor of Israeli Nazareth: ‘If it were up to me, I’d deport Tibi to Gaza’"
“Mayor of Upper Nazareth (adjacent to Israeli Arab Nazareth –Ed.), terrorist Shimon Gapso, attacked the chairman of the Ta’al (Arab Movement for Renewal) party, MP Ahmad Tibi, in an interview that appeared in the Yediot HaGalil newspaper. In crude statements that demonstrated severe racism about his unwillingness to see Arabs live in his town, and about his declared goal to Judaize the Galilee, Gapso said of Tibi: ‘Tibi is a foreigner in our state. He makes his living at the expense of the state, and instead of thanking the Jews for not expelling or killing him and his family in 1948, as his people would have done to the Jews if they ever had the power, he walks freely among us and takes advantage of (Israeli) democracy to spread hate, and he preaches to us about racism, morality and freedom of expression.’
Gapso went on to say: ‘In my view, Ahmad Tibi is an enemy in every sense of the word. A fifth column who contacts the enemy outside the country at every possible opportunity. If it were up to me, I’d deport him to Gaza together with those who incite against Israel and those who hate it, so that they could live in their own state among their own people.’
MP Ahmad Tibi responded to this racist incitement by saying: ‘Racism has become mainstream on the Israeli street, and all fascist racists speak out unashamedly. Gapso and the like, Liberman and his party, are reaping [support] before the upcoming elections at the expense of Arabs, through incitement and racism. We were here before Gapso and his ilk, and we’ll stay here after he’s gone… If there’s somebody who’s got to go, then the one who came last should be the one to go first… We, the original inhabitants of this land, didn’t arrive here by plane or by ship, and we aren’t going to leave.”
“Mayor of Upper Nazareth (adjacent to Israeli Arab Nazareth –Ed.), terrorist Shimon Gapso, attacked the chairman of the Ta’al (Arab Movement for Renewal) party, MP Ahmad Tibi, in an interview that appeared in the Yediot HaGalil newspaper. In crude statements that demonstrated severe racism about his unwillingness to see Arabs live in his town, and about his declared goal to Judaize the Galilee, Gapso said of Tibi: ‘Tibi is a foreigner in our state. He makes his living at the expense of the state, and instead of thanking the Jews for not expelling or killing him and his family in 1948, as his people would have done to the Jews if they ever had the power, he walks freely among us and takes advantage of (Israeli) democracy to spread hate, and he preaches to us about racism, morality and freedom of expression.’
Gapso went on to say: ‘In my view, Ahmad Tibi is an enemy in every sense of the word. A fifth column who contacts the enemy outside the country at every possible opportunity. If it were up to me, I’d deport him to Gaza together with those who incite against Israel and those who hate it, so that they could live in their own state among their own people.’
MP Ahmad Tibi responded to this racist incitement by saying: ‘Racism has become mainstream on the Israeli street, and all fascist racists speak out unashamedly. Gapso and the like, Liberman and his party, are reaping [support] before the upcoming elections at the expense of Arabs, through incitement and racism. We were here before Gapso and his ilk, and we’ll stay here after he’s gone… If there’s somebody who’s got to go, then the one who came last should be the one to go first… We, the original inhabitants of this land, didn’t arrive here by plane or by ship, and we aren’t going to leave.”