The municipality of Umm al-Fahm announced on their official Facebook page that their schools "are free" of activities which would encourage youth to enlist in the IDF, the Im Tirtzu movement reported.
On Monday, Lt. Col. Bmil. Hisham Abu Riya, who is responsible for the recruitment of Muslims in the Ministry of Defense, was interviewed on Kan Bet.
He recounted: "I personally entered schools in Umm al-Fahm and held group activities there." Later, it was publicly posted on the municipality's Facebook page that "the schools are free of such things."
The municipality also posted that they "follow these trends through the education department and are in full communication with the school administrations in order to prevent any such activity."
"Mentioning Umm al-Fahm comes only as a deliberate attempt to distort the name Umm al-Fahm, and is a lie and a slander to promote the project. Umm al-Fahm will remain the fortified national fortress and compass of the Arab community."
In response, Lach Yerushalayim chairman Maor Tzemach and the chairman of Im Tirtzu Matan Peleg came out with a statement: "We received an explicit admission from the mayor's mouth about the alleged sedition and prevention of recruitment among school students in Umm al-Fahm. To the extent that this message was indeed drafted by the mayor, he should be prosecuted for sedition."
"We are fighting for equality in the solemn responsibility to protect Israel to be shouldered by all sectors of Israeli society, and it is impossible for a mayor to actively work to prevent the integration of the Arab community in the IDF - without a response from authorities!''