Day: July 17, 2024

Benjamin Netanyahu, his close associates and ministers are trying to use the attempted assassination of former US President Donald Trump in Pennsylvania at the weekend to allege that there is incitement against him from the Israeli prime minister’s political opponents.

His weekly cabinet session on Sunday focused on this issue. Cabinet Secretary Yossi Fuchs showed a compilation of critics of the government engaging in “incitement against the prime minister”, with various protesters and others heard describing Netanyahu as a “traitor”, “Satan” and an “enemy of the people”.

After discussions lasting about two hours, Netanyahu ordered another session on the subject to be held next week, in the presence of the law enforcement agencies, the government’s judicial advisor and internal security agency Shin Bet, in order to obtain data regarding the incitement allegations and the steps to be taken. The ministers linked the Trump assassination attempt to “incitement against the prime minister.”

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“The attempted assassination of President Trump is a direct result of the disrupted campaign of incitement and delegitimisation against him,” wrote Diaspora Affairs Minister Amichai Chikli on X. “In Israel, a shockingly identical campaign of incitement is being waged against Prime Minister Netanyahu and enjoys complete secrecy from the ombudsman and the law enforcement system solely because it is coming from the ‘right’.”

According to Justice Minister Yariv Levin during the cabinet session, “It is a miracle that what happened in the US has not happened here yet. It warned us of what could happen to us. The judiciary has abandoned the prime minister.”

Minister Miri Regev added that: “Incitement against the prime minister is accumulating. Democracy does not mean burning roads, nor does it mean putting up a picture of the prime minister with blood on his hands. We are facing an impossible reality, long after it is too late.”

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