BICOM

Fifty-thousand people attended a demonstration on Saturday night organised by Druze leaders to protest against the Nation-State Law.

Participants and speakers at the rally in Tel Aviv’s Rabin Squre included Sheikh Tarif, the spiritual leader of the Druze community in Israel,  Brig. Gen. (res.) Amal As’ad, former Shin Bet heads Yuval Diskin and Ami Ayalon, Tel Aviv Mayor Ron Huldai and TV journalist Lucy Aharish.

Sheikh Tarif said: “We have always taken pride in the country. We have never tried to challenge its Jewish identity. We believed that part of its Jewish ethos was that it treated its non-Jewish citizens, chiefly the loyal Druze community, as total equals.”

Former Israel Defence Forces (IDF) Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi said in a TV interview that he attended the rally to show his support for the Druze community: “I’m here to tell them I’m with them, I’ve known them for decades, we have fought alongside each other, and have died together.”

In an interview with Hadashot on Saturday night, Israeli Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan said that those with an anti-government political agenda were “stirring divisions” in Israeli society by criticising the Nation-State Law. Erdan insisted that the government greatly appreciated the Druze community’s contribution to Israel, and claimed that “this rally has nothing to do with the nation-state law”. He went on to say: “There is not a word in this law that hurts the Druze community or any other community.” Communications Minister Ayoub Kara, who is a member of the Druze community, said on Meet the Press that: “This demonstration is being funded by the left.”