MK Ahmed Tibi (United Arab List-Ta’al) spoke out against criticism of “Nakba
Day” demonstrations on Tuesday, calling for Jewish Israelis to show
empathy.
“Recognition and empathy of the other’s suffering is a lofty,
humane value and a step toward peace between nations,” Tibi said at a
demonstration near Umm el-Fahm.
The MK slammed Energy and Water Minister
Uzi Landau (Yisrael Beytenu) for likening Nakba Day events to Nazism, saying the
comparison is “deviant and outrageous.”
In reference to Monday’s Hadash
Party-sponsored Nakba Day event on Tel Aviv University’s campus, Landau said
that it was unthinkable that, while the world marked the victory over the Nazis,
some students identified more with SS soldiers.
Tibi repeated his
statement that Australian and Canadian natives mark their equivalent of Nakba
Day, adding that an American representative attends a memorial of atom bomb
victims in Hiroshima each year.
“Denying the ‘Nakba’ will not erase the
collective memory of a nation that underwent ethnic cleansing in 1948 by erasing
530 villages and creating a refugee problem,” Tibi said.