Haneen Zoabi is an Israeli-Arab politician that decided to participate in a flotilla with Turkish activists to breach the blockage of Gaza in may 2010. As a member of the Israeli-Arab party Balad she was elected to parliament almost four years ago. However, an attempt was made to ban her from the general election that is meant to be held in three weeks. The person behind this was Danny Danon, who managed to get an 11,000-signature petition to the elections committee demanding that her candidacy will be rejected by the central elections committee, and the committee took the decision to disqualify her from participating in the parliamentary elections. But on Sunday, the case was brought to the Supreme Court that is made up by a panel of nine judges that overruled a decision by the central elections committee. Although some of the politicians who backed the move to disqualify her expressed their dissatisfaction concerning the decision that was taken. Zoabi believes that this “political persecution” against her has been going on for the past three years. She also said that “this ruling does little to erase the treats, the physical as well as verbal abuse” she has been enduring although she was assigned with special protection. Her lawyer added that she was treated as a terrorist and attacked personally as a woman. A month ago she again spoke out criticizing Israeli’s offensive on Gaza implying that her country was breaking international law. Which revived activists’ attacks that were waiting for her outside of the Supreme Court and she had to take shelter until security guards secured the place. Although Israeli-Arabs make up 20% of the entire Israeli population and occupy 11 members of the 120-seat parliament attempts were made at each election campaign to prevent them for running.
Ban of Israeli-Arab politician revoked
