Soccer fan arrested for violence.
Soccer fan arrested for violence.Flash 90

Education Minister Shai Piron (Yesh Atid) and Justice Minister Tzipi Livni (Hatnua) denounced on Tuesday the violent incident at Tel Aviv's derby match the previous day, in which a Hapoel Tel Aviv fan assaulted Maccabi Tel Aviv's Eran Zehavi.

"Violence is an action taken by weak people,” said Piron, who linked the event to the 19th anniversary of the assassination of Yitzchak Rabin z”l. “Nineteen years after, we say and repeat: no to violence. Not on the political arena, not in the schools, and not in the soccer field. No more violence. Verbal or physical, hurtful, insulting, crude.”

"Violence is the language of cowards,” he added. “Violence erodes the foundation of Israel's democratic society.”

The last sentence is a famous direct quote from Rabin's last speech, before he was slain.

Livni wrote on her Facebook page "Yesterday it happened on the soccer field. We saw the ugly violence that is blowing up in our faces, in the real world. The violence is penetrating our squares, our sports, and in the end, our social media networks and our children's lives."

Livni said that the tools for solving the problem were education, law enforcement and punishment.

"We will add other tools if need be and become more strict – because racism, violence and hate truly threaten us from within as a society and a state, no less so than the terror that threatens us from outside," she added.