Army Radio DJ fired over support for driver who killed cop

A radio DJ on Israel’s most popular music station was fired Wednesday after expressing support for the man who killed a police officer during an operation to raze illegally built homes in the Bedouin village of Umm al-Hiran.

Border policeman Erez Levi was killed early Wednesday morning after being run over by a car driven by Yaqoub Mousa Abu al-Qia’an, an Umm al-Hiran resident whose home was slated for demolition.

Abu al-Qia’an was killed by police fire, prompting fierce clashes between law enforcement and protesters.

Israeli officials were quick to label the ramming a terror attack, but Arab lawmakers and activists at the scene disputed the claim.

Hours after the morning of deadly violence, Khen Elmaleh, a DJ on the Galgalatz Army Radio popular music channel, seemed to express support for the driver on Facebook.

“I would also run over a cop if they forcibly evicted me from my home in order to build other homes for a community that’s stronger than me — and don’t talk to me about education,” she wrote on her personal page.

Army Radio Chief Yaron Dekel swiftly fired Elmaleh for her comment, saying that “anyone who expresses support for running over a police officer has no place on the airwaves” of IDF-run radio stations.

Elmaleh later deleted the offending post, but expressed regret there was no room to “have a complex discussion about violence directed at civilians.”

“Justice is justice, and anyone can easily find themselves a victim of mistreatment by the establishment,” she wrote on Facebook. “Everyone is a victim here, both the evacuees and the police, some of the worst crimes are committed under the auspices of the law.”

On Wednesday evening, hundreds of protesters gathered in Tel Aviv, Haifa, Jaffa, Nazareth and Qalansawe to denounce the morning of deadly violence.