Education Minister Naftali Bennett (Jewish Home) excoriated Israeli Arab lawmakers Tuesday, days after they penned a public letter of support for UK Labour Party chief and Opposition Leader Jeremy Corbyn amid a series of scandals revolving anti-Semitism.
On Sunday, The Guardian published an open letter written by four MKs from the predominantly Arab Joint List party on behalf of the list’s entire 13-member Knesset delegation.
The letter praised UK Opposition Leader Jeremy Corbyn as a “champion of peace and justice”, while condemning the State of Israel and Zionist movement.
Corbyn, who has led Labour since 2015, has in recent months been at the center of a series of scandals involving claims of anti-Semitism.
Recently, former premiers Tony Blair and Gordon Brown – both Laborites – criticized Corbyn’s leadership amid the multiple anti-Semitism rows.
On Tuesday, Bennett ripped the Joint List party for its open support of Corbyn, accusing them of backing “of anti-Semites and supporters of terror” abroad while ignoring the needs of their own constituents.
“There is no greater hypocrisy than that of Tibi, Zahalka, and their supporters,” said Bennett.
“They sit in the comfort of Israel's democracy, living off Israeli taxpayers, while they spend their time – not working to represent their constituents and improving the lives of Israel's Arab community – but writing letters to the international media in support of anti-Semites and supporters of terror.
“Indeed, they have shown their true colors by going out of their way to voice unanimous support for a man who has been labelled an existential threat to the British Jewish community. They have chosen to stand up for a man who honored the planners of the Munich massacre. So let’s be clear, today the Joint Arab List Members of Knesset have made clear they are supporters of anti-Semitism and terrorism.
The Education Minister called on the Knesset to take action against the Joint List MKs, in particular Deputy Knesset Speaker Ahmed Tibi, a former aid of Yasser Arafat.
“I call on the Speaker of the Knesset to censure in the strongest terms the activity of these MKs, especially, Ahmed Tibi, who as Deputy Speaker of the Knesset chose to use his position of honor in Israeli democracy, to give legitimacy to voices of hatred and racism.
The Daily Mail recently published photos of the Labour leader at a cemetery in Tunisia holding a wreath near the graves of some of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) terrorists who were responsible for the massacre of the 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics.
Days later, a picture emerged of Corbyn apparently making a salute linked to the Muslim Brotherhood organization.
That week, the Times of Londonpublished a picture of Corbyn meeting with the leader-in-exile of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) terrorist organization, only weeks before its members carried out an attack on a Jerusalem synagogue in which six people were murdered.
Later, it was revealed that Corbyn attended a conference with a convicted Hamas leader who was jailed in Israel for his role in orchestrating a string of terrorist attacks that killed more than 100 people between 2001 and 2002.
Last week, the Daily Mailexposed remarks made by Corbyn in 2010 in which he hinted that Israeli officials were controlling the speeches made by British MPs.
Moreover, dozens of Labour members have been suspended over their anti-Semitic statements in recent years, and the party has been criticized for its failure to deal with the anti-Semitism within it.
Labour has also come under fire for its refusal to adopt all the examples in the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of anti-Semitism, though the party’s ruling body is expected to convene on Tuesday and decide whether to adopt all examples.