Israel MKs to counter Joint List pro-equality advocacy in Brussels

Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein “has agreed to examine a proposal by Likud MK Amir Ohana” aimed at “countering efforts” by Joint List lawmakers “to drum up support for a European Union condemnation of Israel over the controversial nation-state law”, reported Israel Hayom.

According to the report, Ohana “wrote to Edelstein to suggest the Knesset send a delegation of lawmakers to Brussels to meet with EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini and Luxembourg’s Foreign Minister ‎Jean Asselborn”, both of whom met last week with Joint List MKs.

The meetings are part of international outreach that parliamentarians from the Joint List have embarked on, following the passage of the “Jewish nation-state” law, legislation which Palestinian citizens and international observers have condemned as racist.

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Likud MK Ohana chaired the Knesset committee that formulated the legislation, and has told Edelstein that he “would be honoured” to take part and even head a delegation that would meet with the very same officials in an effort to “refute the Joint Arab List’s campaign of lies”.

Ohana accused the Joint List MKs of meeting with EU officials in order to destroy Israel’s “democratic character through blatant lies and the distortion of reality in regard to the nation-state law”.

“We must not wait for the Joint Arab List’s lies to make their way around the world,” Ohana urged, saying “swift and effective counteraction must be taken in the form of an official parliamentary delegation that will act on the same plane and meet with those same officials.”

Israel Hayom noted that “as Knesset speaker, Edelstein has the authority to decide on parliamentary delegations’ overseas trips as well as the composition of such delegations.”

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