35 thoughts on “Israeli Palestinian MK Assaulted in Knesset – Tikun Olam תיקון עולם إصلاح العالم
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  1. Thanks for your coverage of so many of the different aspects of this horror.

    By the way, Chanin is not an accurate transliteration of the name. It is better translated Hanin, better yet 7anin with the 7 being a standard way of representing the Arabic hard “H”.

    1. Thanks, I’ve adjusted the spelling accordingly. In Hebrew, which I speak the chet sound is usually transliterated “ch” & not “h.” But I realize Hebrew & Arabic pronounciations & transliterations are diff.

      1. Yes, they are different in some cases, and the ح (Ha) versus Chet (sorry, don’t have Hebrew installed on the computer) is one of them. The sound for ح is not at all similar to the sound generally represented by kh, and is more of a h sound made much deeper in the throat and with greater force.

        1. Forgive me for the digression but I will now think of you Shirin when I read the Quran and come across the letter ح

          🙂

  2. MK Zoabi has my sincerest thanks and deep admiration for the work she’s doing for Israel’s future. She is a true patriot.

  3. This video show a negative thing ans a positive thing:

    Negative:

    MKs get so easily dominated by their emotions and cannot control themselves, like children. It makes it impossible to get a rational debate. They behave like any normal people in the street. In fact, I believe that they behave as bad and childish, irrational, and emotional as most politicians across the middle east, including Presidents, ministers and parliament members of many other got-blooded middle eastern countries. This is negative because I would have preferred you to behave better than them. By the way, this is not the first time, I have seen such emotional quarrels and insults also among Jewish MKs.

    Positive:
    In spite of the behavior of the MKs, the institutional democratic and tolerant spirit prevailed by having the Israeli guards take out most of the MKs out of the chamber by force in defense of MK Zoabi right to speak. Enough said.

    1. In spite of the behavior of the MKs, the institutional democratic and tolerant spirit prevailed by having the Israeli guards take out most of the MKs out of the chamber by force in defense of MK Zoabi right to speak

      Not only don’t you understand Hebrew, you didn’t bother to read the post. She was not permitted to speak. They shouted her down & she left with a tear in her eye at the abuse hurled at her. If this is positive, then we must be in an alternate universe.

      1. My statement that

        “the Israeli guards took out most of the MKs out of the chamber by force in defense of MK Zoabi right to speak”

        is absolutely correct. So please retract your accusation that I didn’t read the post.

        Also it is a positive aspect that the interfering MKs were taken out by force. Don’t you agree? You surely agree that expelling the MKs was a good action.

        I mentioned there are negatives aspects too, but expelling the MKs in defense of Zoabi was certainly not a negative action. A negative would be that unfortunately those actions were not enough to calm the angry crowd.

        By the way, Richard, why you routinely react so aggressively at my posts?

  4. Your title “Israeli Palestinian MK Assaulted in Knesset” is false, and misleading. There was no assault.

    It is true that guards prevented another MK from getting to close to Zoabi, just in case. One can speculate what would have happen if the guards had not stepped in so quickly. We cannot be sure that there wouldn’t have been an assault in that hypothetical case, although I think it would be more likely some unacceptable pushing-pulling would have occured, but probably it would not have gotten to constitute full assault. In any case, no assault took place.

    Your title, nevertheless, constitutes unfair media reporting.

    1. Did you miss this in the anchor’s narrative?

      Our correspondent summarizes the hearing and the riot, the likes of which has never been seen before…A troupe of bodyguards accompanied the Member of Knesset Haneen Zou’abi in the course of the discussion and thereafter, for fear that [other MKs] would try to beat her.

      What would you prefer? “Near assault?” And by the way there are more types of assaults than beating a poor woman to a pulp. There are verbal assaults, emotional assaults. Do you think they hurt any less? No, I stand by my post title.

  5. I just would like to know why normal, peace-loving Jews feel a connection to Israel. I just don’t get it. Do they really feel they have anything in common at all with Israelis? I just can’t understand why so many Jews continue to defend the indefensible perpetrated by people with whom they have nothing in common whatsoever, except religion. It’s ludicrous.

    1. Kalea,
      Israel has many facets, some good, some bad.
      It has been inflicted with the disease of “occupation” in the last 40 years, which is like a cancer eating it from within.
      One of the reasons to fight for peace and for Palestinian rights is to save Israel from itself, although of course this is not the only reason.

      1. Dori,

        Israel wasn’t inflicted with a disease. Israel sliced its own wrists.

        As you probably know, Israel wasn’t founded 40 years ago out of thin air.

        Somehow you seem to forget that the land on which Israeli Dreks currently sit, there were thousands of Palestinians whose lives were changed forever as a result of a Drek of an ideology which many psudo-peace loving self-styled leftists in Israel subscribes to.

        You can pretend that the two state solution will make reality go away, you can also pretend that an end to the occupation will somehow solve all the problems that started more than a hundred years ago in Basel.

        But, you can’t ignore the thousands who were kicked out of their homes from Jaffa, from Ramla, from Lod and Haifa. You can sweep it under the carpet, but that doesn’t change reality. It won’t go away.

        If you have an alcoholic friend you take him to rehab, you don’t change the label on the vodka bottles he drinks from just to help you forget.

        1. Avi,
          I am not sure that the word “Drek” should be allowed according to the commenting rules of this blog. Anyhow, thanks for calling me a Drek.
          I agree that not everything will be solved with the end of the occupation, and that the Nakbeh is a severe problem too. However, we cannot solve all the Israeli diseases at once. I believe promoting peace between Israelis and Palestinians is the first step in the solution of the refugee problem too. Perhaps also some solution to the refugee problem will come out during the peace talks. We should remember that many years have passed, and that I (and probably you) were born into this situation, we did not create it. So you may say that I was born a “Drek”, and this is my primal sin. Perhaps.

      2. It has been inflicted with the disease of “occupation” in the last 40 years…

        Ah yes, the tired old “Israel was such a great moral upstanding nation until the occupation came along and corrupted it” canard. Give me a break! How can any country whose creation and maintenance necessitated massacres, massive ethnic cleansing, plunder of property, and oppression ever be seen as moral and upstanding? Israel was created in part by the ethnic cleansing of somewhere around a million human beings (the 750,000 registered refugees plus tens of thousands who did not register as refugees) who could trace their history on the land back many generations. It included the obliteration of hundreds of villages, monuments, and historical sites.

        Israel did not change its basic nature as a result of the occupation, Israel has always been what it is now. Israel’s problem is not the occupation, it is Zionism and a racism that counts European Jews as superior beings, even over their non-European fellow Jews.

        Oh yes, and the occupation is not a disease, it is a deliberate structure created and maintained by the Israeli state in order to ultimately realize the Zionist dream of Greater Israel.

        Wake up and spell the coffee.

        1. Shirin,
          I never talked about the question of whether Israel is moral or not. Ending the occupation, though, will solve many of the problems, but of course not all of them.
          As to the narrative that all the fault is in one side, this is also all wrong. Both sides are to blame for various things. I don’t like this imbalanced talk, which leads nowhere and does not allow any dialogue at all, just hatred.
          We should learn to accept the crimes we made at the same time as pointing the crimes of the other side. Things are more complex than black or white, almost no one is absolutely good or absolutely bad (Except for perhaps extreme cases such as Nazi Germany, or Stalin).

    2. I write this blog partly because I am a Jew and have a connection to Israel. I freely admit my connection is not the same as those American Jews in the Israel lobby. But Israel is important to me just as justice and morality are important to me.

  6. In the US, if she had had entered a foreign entity’s organization, especiallly one that was at war with the USA, she would meet the same if not worse criticism. The criticism is not baseless.

    However, they are adults and should not devolve into hurling insults at her and threating her. That’s just stupid.

    1. In the US, if she had had entered a foreign entity’s organization, especiallly one that was at war with the USA, she would meet the same if not worse criticism.

      No, you have no idea of the traditions and decorum of the Congress. It’s far fr. a perfect organization but it’s been over 100 years since anyone was assaulted on the floor of Congress.

    2. She didn’t “enter a foreign entity’s organization that was at war with Israel”, she joined a group of mostly European activists who are opposed to the illegal and inhuman blockade of the necessities of daily life to the human beings in Gaza, and who sought to bring desperately needed aid to those people and in doing so to make a political statement.

    3. Where would Hasbara be without the word “entity”? It’s really crucial for the cherry-picking between different realities that is such a cornerstone of Israeli policy.

  7. When the leaders behave this way, what can we expect from the people? “Busha u’chlima” – shameful.

    1. I hope he fails, I am really worried about the fate of Israeli democracy.

      —————–

      You sound like a relative of mine who recently said that these are bad times for democracy in Israel.

      What I said to him, which I will say to you too, is:

      When was Israel ever a democracy?

      Allowing a a few Palestinians to be token members of Knesset for decorative purposes, doesn’t make Israel a democracy. It’s a nice * Kishoot *, it makes it easier for Israel to claim that it is a democracy, but there was never an Arab party that was included in the government coalitions, EVER.

      1. The point with democracy, is that it has many aspects to it. Some of them are relatively well kept in Israel, others less.
        Without the occupation, Israel could have been a second-rate democracy, which is better than no democracy at all.
        In the elections before last, there was an appointed Israeli Arab minister, which is far too little, but it was a good start.
        Now that the Libermanism is roaming around, no one continues with this tradition, and I am extremely worried from the ongoing de-ligitimation of the arab MPs.
        I shed tears together with MP Zuabi when I see how the democracy is deteriorating on a daily basis.
        I hope some rational forces will manage to counter the uprising fascism in Israel. I am planning to return to Israel this summer, and I am very worried with the recent developments.

  8. About the arabic translation

    “Ruhi li-Ghazza Ya Kha’ina” means “go to Gaza, you traitor”, not “you animal”.

    1. Thank you. The translator knows Hebrew, not Arabic. She actually placed a question mark next to the word “traitor” in Arabic. I excised her question mark. So it’s my fault & thanks for the correct translation.

    2. Thanks! Deciphering curses in Arabic & Russian is a trial and tribulation for this translators (and really, outside of the Knesset & the occasional wiretap of criminals, who uses those?)

      Noted & added to my vocabulary.

  9. You sure have twisted this story around. This was a knesset discussion where each speaker was allocated one minute to talk. It was a heated discussion especially when Zoabi’s turn to speak came. MK Shama (Likud) did his best to protect her right to speak but when he failed he took a five minute recess and Rivlin (Likud) replaced him and did his best to allow her to speak. Each MK which interrupted her was escorted out of the room and her right to speak was protected. Finally, because she exceeded by far her one minute and refused to stop speaking she too was escorted from the podium. Watch at 5:17 on the clip you posted how MK Zoabi assaults a Jewish MK, I believe his name is Hason. Also Knesset security has provided Zoabi with security protection of the level usually reserved for ministers (I read in yesterday’s hard copy Yediot). So Zoabi, because she has parliamentary immunity, was not arrested after being taken off the flotilla, her right to speak in Parliament was protected by its speaker in spite of the fact that she has made common cause with Israel’s enemies and her safety is protected by the knesset security. That’s why we claim to be the only democracy in the Middle East.
    Take Turkey for example. Turkey is 18% Kurdish, a similar proportion to Israel’s Arab population. “(Turkey) refuses to allow Kurdish education in schools and official settings, such as in Parliament, arguing that it would divide the country along ethnic lines.” How would Turkey respond if a Turkish MP showed support for the Kurdish separatists? According to Wikipedia “On December 11, 2009, the Constitutional Court of Turkey voted to ban the DTP(Democratic Society Party), accusing it of connection with PKK.[1] Türk was expelled from the Grand National Assembly, and 36 other party members were banned from joining any political party for five years.[2]” So much for Turkey being a democracy.

    1. If I recall the Israeli TV anchor said Zoabi did not succeed in delivering her remarks. As for Zoabi allegedly assaulting anyone, do you really mean to say that a diminutive Palestinian woman who looks all of 5 feet and 96 lbs. could actually harm a big burly Israeli he-man like Hason? She must pack a mean wallop.

      she has made common cause with Israel’s enemies

      Look this hasbara bulls(&t may pass muster inside your country. But you’re not in your country when you’re here. Here we don’t cotton to sloganeering and political grandstanding. We look at national policy soberly. Zoabi and all those of us who are opposed to the siege are not doing this to support any political movement. We’re doing it because it is immoral, illegal and doesn’t work. So rave on all you want. But no one here buys the crap you’re peddlin’. So if you want to argue things free of cant, you’re welcome. But if all you want to do is peddle what you read in Yisrael HaYom or heard on Arutz Sheva, that won’t go over well here.

      her safety is protected by the knesset security. That’s why we claim to be the only democracy in the Middle East.

      You mean the fact that she needed a security detail that would ordinarily accompany a foreign leader in order to prevent her being lynched on the floor of the Knesset is supposed to support the notion that Israeli is the only democracy in the Middle East (a claim that is a lie on its face since there are others besides Israel–that is if you credit Israel as being a democracy at all). That’s pretty rich.

      Arguing about Turkey’s record on ethnic minorities is a red herring tactic derived straight fr. the hasbara manual. BTW, the Constitutional Court is at war with the current Turkish government, which is trying to reform such institutions such that they are answerable & accountable to the government.

  10. I like the flag she’s holding in the Facebook drawing – if King David were alive today, are we all so sure he wouldn’t denounce Israel’s criminal regime and close ranks with the Palestinians?

    1. The flag’s one little detail I noticed as well. I like it. I’m certain that to whoever drew the caricature it’s a destillation of high treason, but to me it looks rather integrative.

  11. When I saw this clip on the Mosaic news show I couldnt believe my eyes. Thanks for providing more background.

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