UMM AL-FAHM
Israeli police and stone-throwing Arabs clashed in northern Israel on Wednesday as a group of extreme right-wing Israelis tried to march through the Arab Israeli town of Umm al-Fahm.
Hundreds of police clad in riot gear fired tear gas and stun grenades to disperse angry Arab youths, many with scarves wrapped around their faces, who burned tyres and hurled stones in protest ahead of an extremist rally in their town.
Tensions were high as around 20 Israeli demonstrators turned up for a protest march calling for a ban on the radical wing of the Israeli Islamic Movement, which is led by the firebrand preacher Sheikh Raed Salah.
“Death to terrorists!” they shouted, waving banners reading: “Make the Islamic Movement illegal,” and “Death to Raed Salah,” although they were prevented from marching by police who hemmed them in with three coaches, an AFP correspondent at the scene said.
Police said they arrested 10 Arab Israelis for stone throwing, and at least one person was wounded — the town’s member of parliament, Afu Agbaria, who was taken to hospital after a tear gas canister slammed into his leg, an AFP correspondent said.
The controversial march roughly coincides with the 20th anniversary of the assassination of Rabbi Meir Kahane, a right-wing extremist who routinely referred to Arabs as “dogs” and called for their expulsion from Israel.
“The Islamic Movement is part of the international Islamic jihad,” said MP Michael Ben Ari, who accused it of having ties to the Palestinian militant groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
Ahead of the march, Arab municipal officials and dozens of counter-protesters waving Palestinian flags gathered in the town, AFP correspondents said, as police deployed in force to prevent clashes.
