New Hope chairman Gideon Sa'ar attacked Prime Minister Netanyahu Sunday morning, warning that the prime minister's tactics were divisive and leading Israel towards a civil war.
In an interview with Reshet Bet, Sa'ar blamed Netanyahu for a violent attack on a New Hope campaign event by Netanyahu supporters. "I still haven't heard any condemnation or renunciation from Netanyahu. Anyone who sends thugs to attack an event and beat people up is afraid of us. They were sent by someone, they didn't come by chance. Netanyahu was silent even when I was called a traitor at his events. He delegitimizes and systematically defames political opponents as his standard operating procedure."
Sa'ar described yesterday's incident: "They send thugs to us and not to any other party. This was a very serious incident. Dozens of thugs from Likud vehicles and loudspeakers came to disrupt our event. During the event there was a disturbance with them screaming 'traitors' on the loudspeakers and throwing stones and eggs."
He stated that Netanyahu "has a hearing problem. A person who allows his people to violently disrupt other people's events is a coward. I call on him to come confront me himself each and every time rather than sending these thugs to my events.
Sa'ar said that Netanyahu's actions have led him to support amending the law to bar a prime minister from remaining in office while under indictment. "In the past, I thought it was wrong to change this law, because it could be perceived as personal. After a year in which Netanyahu has served with a trial being held against him and we have seen how he puts his personal interests over the state's interests, he has proven every day that he cannot wage the struggle for his innocence without his personal interests affecting the management of state affairs. So I said we would consider this possibility. It will not be a retroactive change anyway. The 25th Knesset needs to seriously examine this matter."