The HaTikva party – which is led by Dr. Aryeh Eldad and is part of the National Union – put up a protest sukkah Tuesday at Mamsheet junction east of Be'er Sheva, to call attention to illegal construction by the Bedouin Arab minority in the Negev.
The party's leadership sat in the sukkah – the makeshift hut which the Bible tells Jews to reside in during the Sukkot holiday – and listened to Negev resident Emanuel Binyamin, who told them of his struggle to block Bedouin illegal construction. They discussed the administrative means to fight the phenomenon.
The HaTikva party stated that it intends to collect files of information on the subject, to demand answers from the government and to file lawsuits against authorities that do not carry out their legal obligation to enforce laws of planning and construction.
MK Eldad said that “even with the tiny way in which the State of Israel is enforcing the law and finally demolishing several illegal houses, there is a concern that the criminal violent response of the Bedouins and their deliberate damage of the site at Ovdat will deter the State of Israel's enforcement authorities and prevent them from enforcing the law in the future.”
"This has been the Bedouins' system for many years, and the private citizens of the Negev and the entire state are subject to threats and blackmail,” he asserted.