Yair Lapid and Itamar Ben Gvir
Yair Lapid and Itamar Ben GvirYossi Zeliger/Flash90, Gili Yaari/Flash90

Foreign Minister Yair Lapid (Yesh Atid) said in a conversation with activists that the chairman of the Otzma Yehudit Party, Itamar Ben Gvir, is the dominant figure in the opposition, and claimed that the Likud party hates Arabs the same way that the "La Familia" group of Beitar Jerusalem fans does.

"Netanyahu is not the one leading the opposition, he is too weak," Lapid said, as quoted by Haaretz newspaper. "Itamar Ben Gvir is the one leading it. In the Likud, nationalism has been replaced by Arab hatred in the style of La Familia. They decided that if they can be removed from power in a democracy, then it is time to get rid of democracy. As much as it's up to me, we will not allow them to do so."

This past Monday, at a special Knesset session in memory of the late Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, Lapid attacked the Religious Zionist Party and said that "Yigal Amir's ideological descendants are sitting in the Knesset of Israel today."

His remarks were interrupted by opposition MKs. "You mean the Joint List? Aren't you ashamed?" said MK Bezalel Smotrich, who left the plenum in protest alongside some Shas and Likud MKs.

Lapid continued, "There is a clear parallel line between Rabin's assassination and the past year, both are part of the great Israeli struggle, it is not between right and left, but between people who believe in democracy and people who try to destroy it. Rabin was not killed by the right, a true right is democratic, but rather by those who are not willing to accept Israeli democracy."

"If someone tells himself that the majority does not decide, he is not really part of the national camp - he is an extremist and dangerous nationalist. Instead of loving the country, he hates those who do not think like him," Lapid said.