Right-wing activist charged with incitement, supporting terror

State prosecutors will, today (Tuesday), charge the chairman of the Lehava anti-assimilation group, Bentzi Gopstein, with incitement to racism and supporting terror.

Gopstein is charged for inciting violence in a number of interviews of speaking to media outlets from 2012 to 2017. In addition he is charged with publicizing racist comments, and supporting terrorism by lauding Baruch Goldstein's actions in the Tomb of the Patriarchs in 1994.

When asked about an incident in 2012, where a number of Jewish youths attacked three Arab men, Gopstein said, "I don't know exactly what happened. It seems these youth lifted Jewish pride from the floor and did what the police should do. They handed out 'street justice' to the Arabs that bothered Jewish girls."

On Tuesday, Gopstein responded to the indictment by saying that Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit and prosecutor Shai Nitzan "supported by the reform movement inside the justice department, have decided that fighting assimilation is racism. This is a black day, where the attorney general goes against the Torah. I am certain that if Matityahu and Judah Maccabee would have lived today, they would be in jail for racism."

"It won't stop me, I will continue to work to save Jewish girls and for the Jewish state. We survived Pharaoh and Ahasuerus, we will survive Mandelblit and Nitzan."

Gopstein's attorney, Itamar Ben-Gvir said "these charges show the persecution against Gopstein. What is never done against the inciters from the Muslim community or from the far left is done to Gopstein."