Druze protest law fast-tracking construction permit enforcement at Isfiya ceremony

A memorial event in the northern Israeli Druze town of Isfiya goes smoothly, despite tensions over laws passed in recent years that the Druze community regards as discriminatory.

At the event, Likud MK and Economy and Industry Ministry Nir Barkat takes responsibility on behalf of the government for the events of October 7.

“The government of Israel carries full responsibility for everything that happens in the state,” he says.

Last year, Intelligence Minister Gila Gamliel (also Likud) was prevented from entering the military cemetery in the town partly because of her support for a law that enshrined Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people.

Activists demonstrate peacefully outside the cemetery against another law — a 2017 amendment to a planning law fast-tracking enforcement action against illegal building, removing the need to go through the courts.

Building permits are difficult to secure in the Arab community, and illegal building flourishes as a result.

Addressing the ceremony, Druze spiritual leader Sheikh Mowafaq Ṭarīf says the government must “stop the talk,” honor the “covenant of blood” between the Druze and the Jewish people, which sees all Druze men drafted into the IDF, and take steps to allow young Druze to build legally on their land — allocating land for the living, and not just for the dead.