Eli Yishai
Eli YishaiIsrael news photo: Flash 90

Infiltrators need to be detained as an preliminary step toward their deportation, Minister of Interior Eli Yishai said in an interview to the Maariv daily Thursday.

"I only sound racist or unenlightened or xenophobic, but I am acting out of a love of the country, and knowledge that I have no other country," he said.

"The infiltrators along with the Palestinians will bring a hasty end to the Zionist dream," he explained. "There is no country that is as sensitive as we are to human rights, but we have enough worries in the fields of health and welfare, and we do not need to import more worries from Africa."

The minister, who is also Shas party chairman, claimed that some women who have been assaulted by African infiltrators are afraid to file complaints with the police for fear that their identity will become known and their relatives will think they have contracted AIDS.

Yishai attacked human rights activists who defend the infiltrators. "Southern Tel Aviv has become the country's garbage bin," he accused. "To all of the bleeding hearts who speak against me – I suggest that they take a few dozen infiltrators in to their own neighborhoods. Let them see them every day, let their children try to play in the same playgrounds."

"The first thing we need is more lockup facilities and detention camps, because our jails will fill up very fast. I suggest that we pardon thousands of non-dangerous prisoners and so make room for the infiltrators who pose a much greater threat to the public peace."