Arab MK Hanin Zoabi (Joint List) has come out with a call, demanding that Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas be replaced for being a "bully" towards Arabs who have abandoned the "illusion" of peace with Israel.
Zoabi has long been an open supporter of Hamas, and in February she paid a condolence visit to the families of Arab terrorists.
In a recent speech at a panel in Nazareth the MK called to change the PA leadership, questioning its functioning and its security cooperation with Israel.
Palestinian journalist Wadia Ouda reported the contents of Zoabi's speech in an article on the Al-Quds news site, which was cited by Yedioth Aharonoth on Monday.
According to Ouda, Zoabi said the PA is acting as a bully and is oppressing the Palestinian people, and even is preventing Palestinian Arabs from expressing protest against it on Facebook.
"How to rebel against the leadership and its functioning and how will we replace it and even bypass it if it is impossible to protest?," Zoabi said as cited by the Palestinian journalist.
The Arab member of the Israeli Knesset praised Palestinians for leaving "the illusion of the existence of an Israeli peace partner."
But she called for groups of young Palestinians trying to lead a "new line" to rely on themselves, because they are being prevented by the PA according to her.
Continuing her criticism of the PA, Zoabi said, "the (Palestinian) Authority is an obstacle for change that is suppose to be conducted from the base to the ground," indicating that the PA has not been leading from the top downwards.
Zoabi said her Balad faction of the Joint List party advanced a project of "a civilian state" against "the colonialist Zionist project," referencing its efforts to remove the Jewish nature from the state of Israel and make it a state of its civilians rather than the Jewish state.
She added that her party views itself as part of the "Palestinian national liberation project."
The MK added that she views the unity deal between Hamas and Abbas' Fatah faction sealed in April 2014 as a gamble on the possibility of agreement between the two rival parties. She said that pressure is being exerted on both groups to bypass their interests for unity, and this is causing them both to split internally.
Zoabi refused a request by Yedioth Aharonoth to comment on her statements.