Hundreds at right-wing Haifa rally against terror

Some 500 right-wing Jews demonstrated in Haifa late Saturday over the ongoing terror wave, saying the Netanyahu government was not acting aggressively enough to stop the terror.

The demonstration, in the northern city’s German Colony neighborhood, was described by organizers as a rally in memory of the murdered victims of recent attacks, including Israeli couple Eitam and Naama Henkin, who were gunned down in front of their four children on October 1 while driving in the northern West Bank.

“Jewish blood is not worthless,” read the banner on rally literature.

According to the Ynet news site, some demonstrators shouted anti-Arab slogans, including against Members of Knesset from the Arab Joint List.

The neighborhood is home to many of the mixed city’s Arab residents and their restaurants and other businesses.

A small counter-demonstration by a few dozen Arab residents saw cries of “in blood and fire we will redeem the martyr,” and calls for Muslims to defend the al-Aqsa Mosque on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount.

Hundreds of police officers separated the demonstrators, according to Ynet, with Haifa’s chief of police Avi Edri at the scene to ensure calm.

A handful of scuffles were reported as the demonstrations broke up late into the night between protesters from either rally who were headed home.

One demonstrator, Avi Farhan, a former resident of the evacuated Sinai settlement of Yamit and the evacuated Gaza settlement bloc Gush Katif, used his speech at the rally to call on Zionist Union leader MK Isaac Herzog and Yisrael Beytenu head MK Avigdor Liberman to join the Netanyahu government and form a “national emergency government.”

Three protesters – two Arab and one Jewish – were arrested during the demonstrations. One of the Arab protesters was held for spitting on a police officer.

Arab protests drew hundreds in several Israeli cities Saturday, including Afula, Ramle and Nazareth Ilit.