The Supreme Court began hearings Tuesday morning on petitions by the Balad and Ra'am-Ta'al Arab parties to overturn last week's decision by the central elections committee to disqualify them from the February 10th Knesset elections because they do not recognize Israel as a Jewish state.

At the start of the hearing, there was a confrontation between Chairman Avigdor Liberman of the Yisrael Beiteinu party and leaders of the Arab parties. Liberman said "We have to deal with certain Arab Members of Knesset as we dealt with Hamas. In case the court allows the Arab parties to run, the Knesset will have to place limits on disloyalty."