Zain Khalil / Anatolia
The Israeli Knesset (parliament) approved, in a preliminary reading, on Wednesday, a bill banning the raising of the Palestinian flag, while the Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs considered that this is evidence that the Israeli regime is “heading towards fascism.”
The Israeli newspaper “Haaretz” said that the bill was submitted by Representative Almog Cohen of the “Jewish Power” party, led by the extremist Minister of National Security, Itamar Ben Gvir.
And 54 Knesset members voted in favor of the bill, compared to 16 opponents, according to the same source.
The newspaper added: “If it is approved in three readings, it will be possible to impose a sentence of up to one year in prison on those who wave the Palestinian flag.”
Until now, the authority to ban waving Palestinian flags in public places has been given to the Israeli police chief, and under the “police decree” (the law regulating its work) he is allowed to do so as long as the flag is “a symbol that can provoke a breach of the peace,” according to Haaretz.
However, the Attorney General of the Israeli government allowed in 2006 and 2014 to ban the raising of the Palestinian flag when there is a “high level of probability of a serious breach of public peace.”
In turn, the Palestinian Foreign Ministry considered, in a statement issued by it, that “passing this law with preliminary reading is evidence that the ruling system in Israel is heading towards fascism, in implementation of the directions of the ruling fascist and racist right.”
She added that the law “also falls within the framework of perpetuating apartheid as a discriminatory system targeting Palestinian citizens and depriving them of their most basic human rights, foremost of which is raising the flag that represents their identity, history, cause and belonging to this land.”
And the Foreign Ministry continued, “The occupying state has always chased, fired at, and pursued the Palestinian flag throughout the previous stages, in flagrant violation of human rights principles and Israel’s obligations as an occupying power in occupied Palestine.”
And she believed that “the failure of the international community to assume its responsibilities towards the occupation as a racist colonial regime, and its drowning in miserable and abhorrent double standards, encourages the occupying state to persist in implementing more of its expansionist colonial projects and perpetuating the apartheid regime.”
The Foreign Ministry also warned, “about the results and repercussions of adopting this law in the Israeli Knesset in the three readings, as it is a dangerous escalation in the arena of conflict, and an official Israeli coup against all efforts exerted to resolve it through peaceful means.”
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