Netanyahu calls for dialogue between his government and Arab MKs

Liberman says no way

By Lahav Harcov, JPOST

Government Ministers and Arab MKs should work on a socioeconomic plan to help the Israeli Arab population, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu proposed in his first meeting with Joint List chairman Ayman Odeh Thursday.

The two met in the Prime Minister’s Office and mostly discussed Israeli Arabs’ socioeconomic situation.

Netanyahu pointed out that his governments invested significant funds in Israeli Arabs in the past six years and said that there is a need to continue and reduce social gaps in Israel.

In that vein, Netanyahu proposed that there be a regular dialogue between a group of relevant ministers with Arab MKs in order to draft a socioeconomic plan with the broadest consensus possible.

Following the meeting Odeh released a statement referring to the remarks that Netanyahu made on Election Day in which the prime minister warned that Arab voters are going en masse to the polls.

“I am coming out of a meeting with the prime minister that was not straightforward,” Odeh said.

“I came here with a great responsibility as the person who represents the largest minority in Israel, a minority that the prime minister chose as a shameful election tactic to incite against. It can not be that a prime minister speaks out against citizens who vote,” Oded said.

The head of the Joint List said he shared with Netanyahu his thoughts on the prime minister’s Election Day remarks. He said that the meeting was a working meeting where he told the prime minister the main social issues facing the Arab community such as the lack of affordable housing and employment were discussed.

Hours before the meeting, MK Avigdor Liberman (Yisrael Beytenu) called on Netanyahu to cancel his meeting with Odeh.

Liberman called Odeh the head of “a list of terror-supporters in the Knesset.”

“The prime minister’s meeting with Odeh, one of the vehement opponents of Israel as the state of the Jewish People, legitimizes the forces that work to destroy Israel from the inside and condones the fifth column in the Knesset,” he said.

Liberman pointed out that on Election Day, Netanyahu warned of “Arabs flocking to the polls,” and said the prime minister was right to do so, because anti-Israel elements were involved.

The Yisrael Beytenu head said the Palestinian Authority backed Oudeh and that the Joint List chairman is no different from former MK Azmi Bishara, who fled Israel in 2007 while under investigation for passing information to Hezbollah during the Second Lebanon War.

“Don’t be mistaken about Odeh,” Liberman stated. “He acts cleverly, with a smiling face that hides the same desire that Bishara had to bring an end to the State of Israel. Odeh refused to distance himself from the Joint List’s communications chief who compared Zionism to ISIS and refused to call Hamas a terrorist organization; rather, he backed and legitimized [Hamas’] activities. He also would not criticize [Joint List MK] Haneen Zoabi who legitimized the murder of the three teens in Gush Etzion [last summer].”