President Reuven Rivlin met Sunday with Druze mayors and council heads following their meeting with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to discuss their concerns over the Nationality Law.
The President welcomed them at the President's Residence and said at the beginning of the meeting: "Our partnership is at the foundation and basis of this country. This is the basis, to live in partnership in the country we have established, the Zionist movement, in full partnership with everyone who lives and resides in this good country, for the good of all of us. And we can maintain this equation without any problem."
"I stated my position when the Knesset discussed the issue in the last discussions, sent a letter and expressed my opinion on the subject that was on your agenda: I have no doubt that you are legally equal, and we must make sure you feel equal," added the president.
Chairman of the Forum of Druze and Circassian Authorities and head of the Horfeish Council, Mufid Mar'i told the president: "What hurts the Jews hurts the Druze and what hurts the Druze hurts the Jews. We embrace and are connected."
"We met with the prime minister now and expressed our concern about the law," said Rafik Halabi, head of the Daliyat al-Carmel Regional Council. "We see it as a discriminatory law that does not give expression to our citizenship. We can not live in a country where there are feelings of exclusion among part of the population, which is so loyal and good."
"We come to you to express our pain and distress, and this is not the distress of the heads of the local councils, not only of the officers and the religious, of the entire Arab and Circassian population in Israel. What would you tell them? That they are not citizens? That they are not equal? Basic legislation should address everyone, not just the dominant part," Halabi added.
The president listened to the claims and promised to act as much as he could in order to express their concerns to the relevant authorities. "Partnership and the feelings of partnership are in our souls," he concluded.