Far-right MK who calls for genocide must be sacked, Israel newspaper says

Israel’s Haaretz newspaper has called on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to immediately fire far-right Finance and War Cabinet Minister, Bezalel Smotrich, over his repeated incitement to commit genocide against Palestinians.

In an editorial published on Tuesday, the paper referred to video clips of Smotrich, leader of the far-right Religious Zionism Party, in which he used the Torah to justify calling for the “complete” wiping out of the cities of Rafah, Deir Al-Balah and Nuseirat in Gaza.

Haaretz argued that Smotrich’s dismissal is the only way a properly run country would act, especially a country against which the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague has issued provisional measures requiring it to refrain from genocide, including one requiring it to deal properly with incitement to genocide.

“But in Netanyahu’s Israel, the leader of the extreme right [Smotrich] is openly calling for genocide, and there is not a single person in the government ready to stand up and say: Enough… Either the despicable Kahanists or us.” Kahanists are followers of the extremist Rabbi Meir Kahane, who actively called for the killing and displacement of Palestinians; his movement has been classed as a terrorist organisation in Israel and the US. However, a number of Israeli ministers are followers of Kahane’s ideology.

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The newspaper stressed that “Smotrich must pay the price for his repeated calls for the genocide of the Palestinians (…) and the Public Prosecutor must take the necessary measures against him.”

The Israeli opposition accuses Netanyahu of giving in to Smotrich and far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir blackmail tablets after the pair threatened to topple the coalition government if a ground offensive is not launched in Rafah.