Israelis spooked by Arabic ads for TV show 'Fauda'

Alarmed motorists called police to a major junction in the central city of Holon on Wednesday after they noticed workers posting a large billboard sign on a highway bridge that proclaimed a chilling warning — in Arabic.

The writing, white on black and reminiscent of the Islamic State terror group’s flag, simply said “Get ready.”

Other, similar posters cropped up all over the country. The banners carried various other ominous phrases in Arabic such as “The chaos is about to start,” and “Heading to you.”

Cops were able to reassure passersby in Holon that the forbidding-looking poster was nothing more than an ad for the upcoming season of the hit telivision show “Fauda.”

“Fauda,” about an undercover Israeli unit that operates in the West Bank, is named for the Arabic word for chaos, often used by IDF soldiers to describe their time serving in the West Bank and Gaza, and by Palestinians to depict their daily lives.

(Times of Israel Palestinian affairs analyst Avi Issacharoff is a co-creator of the show.)

Advertiser Mccann Tel Aviv launched an awareness campaign for the show in which billboards were posted at prominent locations around the country, all in a single night, the Hebrew-language Walla website reported Wednesday.

Channel 10 reported Thursday that a poster for the show displayed across a main highway in the Haifa suburb of Nesher was to be removed after a local councilman complained about it.

הזייה : שלט פרסום בערבית של הסדרה ״פאודה״ יוסר מגשר בעיר נשר בשל דרישת חבר המועצה שלומי זינו להסיר שלט בשפה הערבית. @zeragil היה אומר בהחלחח pic.twitter.com/O8GiAmEKlV

— Eli Levi (@10elilevi) December 28, 2017