Some 50 observers representing the Likud and the National Union parties set off from Jerusalem this morning to the Galilee city of Nazareth to help ensure the purity of the election process - but police are not letting them through.
The citizens' intention was to try to prevent ballot-stuffing in areas that have been accused of such in the past. As their bus turned off onto the east-west Hadera-Afula highway at Nachal I'ron (Wadi Ara), two waiting police cars signaled the bus to stop.
No less a personage than I'ron Police Station Commander Kobi Shabtai informed the passengers, "There is a fear that you will cause a provocation, and we cannot let you through." He quoted the law that allows him to take such action when there is a fear of "disturbance of the public welfare."
One of the passengers, Baruch G., 44, asked him afterwards who had given the orders to take such action. "The orders are from above," Shabtai responded.
Baruch also asked another policeman if he does not think that this action is an impediment to the democratic process and the right to exercise a democratic right to observe elections. Speaking on condition of anonymity, the policeman said, "I'm in uniform now; what do you expect me to say? May G-d bless you and preserve you... They might be filming me at this very second."
Arutz-7 turned to the Central Elections Committee to ask for its opinion on the matter. Spokesman Giora Pordis first expressed skepticism about the entire story, asking, "I don't believe that three separate parties cooperated together." He then said he would check with the police.
Contacted several times, Pordis finally said he knows only of "six people that were detained and then released."
Moments later, at 3:45 PM, another passenger, Yonatan Y., told Arutz-7, "Four police cars have now begun escorting and accompanying us to Nazareth. The bus driver's license is being held by the police, to make sure that he doesn't take us anywhere else, and that we get off in Nazareth." He confirmed that the police had held them up for more than two hours.
Once in Nazareth, another busload of would-be observers, together with several cars, gathered together in a local parking lot - a total of 120 people - under the watchful eyes of the police. At 6 PM, the story took another strange turn: The leading Likud representative in the area, Shimon Gafsu, canceled his party's "observer appointments," leaving half the volunteers with nothing to do. He explained to Arutz-7 that of the 70 polling stations in the city, "63 already have staffers, so what do I need them for?"
Though the abrupt cancellation raised some suspicions and angered the volunteers greatly, most of the other volunteers - on behalf of the National Union - decided to go ahead on their own to the polling stations. This, despite the perceived danger of being alone in an Arab area.
The story is reminiscent of a phenomenon that occurred eight months ago on the eve of the large anti-Disengagement protest in Netivot (following a similar one in Kfar Maimon). Buses on their way to the mass rally were stopped by police and turned back - even though the rally had been declared legal. Police officers threatened bus drivers with the revocation of their licenses if they attempted to drive their passengers to the rally.