[After protests in which tens of thousands of Israelis marched
"together against fascism and apartheid," Israels far-right security
minister on Sunday ordered police to tear down Palestinian flags
wherever they are found in public. ]
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IN ‘ACT OF FASCISM AND SUPREMACY,’ ISRAEL BANS PALESTINIAN FLAGS
IN PUBLIC SPACES  
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Brett Wilkins
January 9, 2023
Common Dreams [[link removed]]


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_ After protests in which tens of thousands of Israelis marched
"together against fascism and apartheid," Israel's far-right security
minister on Sunday ordered police to tear down Palestinian flags
wherever they are found in public. _

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Israeli Public Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, leader of the
ultranationalist Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Power) party, said in a
statement that he directed Police Commissioner Kobi Shabtai to
implement the new policy, _The__Times of Israel _reports
[[link removed]].

"Banning our flag—like it once was—is pointless posturing and a
dog whistle to supremacists. It will backfire spectacularly."

"It can't be that lawbreakers wave terror flags, incite and support
terror, and therefore I have ordered that terror-supporting flags be
removed from the public space," explained Ben-Gvir—who
was convicted
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2007 of incitement to racism and supporting a terrorist organization
after he advocated the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.

Husam Zomlot, who heads Palestine's diplomatic mission to the United
Kingdom, on Monday called the flag ban "repressive, racist, and
childish."

"Grow up," Zomlot tweeted
[[link removed]]. "Banning our
flag—like it once was—is pointless posturing and a dog whistle to
supremacists. It will backfire spectacularly."

"Like the original ban, it will encourage instead our people and
freedom-loving people everywhere to brandish the Palestinian flag," he
added, referring to a previous prohibition that sparked widespread
defiance and creative acts of resistance
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it was lifted in 1993 under the Oslo Accords.

Palestinian-American author and policy expert Yousef Munayyer tweeted
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that "Israel holds an entire stateless nation under military
occupation. They got enough nukes to start a regional conflagration.
But they fear a piece of cloth."

On Monday, Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh accused
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new far-right government of pursuing policies "aimed at toppling the
[Palestinian National Authority] and pushing it to the brink
financially and institutionally."

Referring to policies including the withholding
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$40 million in Palestinian tax revenue and the flag ban, Shtayyeh
added that "we consider these measures a new war against the
Palestinian people, their capabilities and funds, and a war against
the national authority."

More than 1 in 5 citizens of Israel are Arabs, most of them
descendants of people who remained in Palestine after the modern state
of Israel was founded there in 1948, largely through terrorism and
ethnic cleansing
[[link removed]] targeting
Palestinians and British occupiers
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Israeli courts have affirmed
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flying Palestinian flags is not a crime.

However, Israeli soldiers and police can remove the flags if they are
deemed to pose a threat to public order.

In practice, Israeli occupation forces often target
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carrying Palestinian flags during protests. Israeli police faced
international condemnation after beating mourners
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arresting people for raising Palestinian flags during the funeral
procession for Shireen Abu Akleh, the Palestinian-American _Al
Jazeera_ reporter killed
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occupation forces last May.

Ben-Gvir's directive also followed the release
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week of 66-year-old Karim Younis, widely described as the "oldest
Palestinian political prisoner," after 40 years behind bars for
killing an Israeli soldier in the illegally occupied Syrian Golan
Heights.

According to _The__Times of Israel_, Shabtai was reprimanded by
Ben-Gvir for failing an order to prevent public celebration in Younis'
village of 'Ara, where a jubilant crowd waved Palestinian flags and
chanted liberation slogans to welcome the freed prisoner home.

_[BRETT WILKINS is a staff writer for Common Dreams.]_

_Licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to
republish and share widely._

* Israel
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* Palestine
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* Palestinians
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* Palestinian flags
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* Benjamin Netanyahu
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* apartheid
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* Fascism
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* Itamar Ben-Gvir
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* Otzma Yehudit
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* zionism
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* Racism
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* Human Rights
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