Office of provocative Arab MK Zoabi burgled

Two computers were stolen from the office of MK Hanin Zoabi when the Nazareth headquarters of the Balad political party was broken into, police said Sunday.

The suspected burglary took place late Saturday or early Sunday. Television equipment was also stolen from the offices.

Police opened an investigation into the incident but no arrests were made.

Zoabi, a firebrand Knesset member who was recently sanctioned by the Knesset Ethics Committee for anti-Israel remarks, hinted that there may have been more to the break-in than simple thievery.

“It doesn’t seem that the motive was criminal because computers that were in other rooms were not stolen and the computers that were stolen were old and had no value,” she told Hebrew-language news site Ynet. “At this stage, we don’t know who is behind this serious matter. I hope the police will get to the burglars and punish them.”

Zoabi is a controversial figure in Israeli politics and has raised the ire of fellow MKs and the public with provocative statements seemingly supporting Hamas and calling for attacks on police.

Earlier this month the Supreme Court rejected an appeal by Zoabi that sought to overturn a Knesset decision banning her from all parliamentary discussions for six months over provocative media statements.

The Knesset’s Ethics Committee decided in July to sanction Zoabi for an interview given to Tel Aviv Radio on June 12, following the kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teenagers south of Jerusalem. Speaking before the fate of the three was known, Zoabi told interviewer Sharon Gal that she did not consider the kidnappers to be terrorists, but rather “people who see no other way to change their reality.”

In a separate article published on her party’s website, also weighed by the Knesset’s Ethics Committee, Zoabi called for “a siege” to be placed on Israel and for an end to peace talks and Palestinian security coordination with it.