A police complaint was filed Wednesday against Yahad chairman Eli Yishai for possible incitement over a Yahad election ad that asked the public to ensure there “won’t be a child with two fathers.”
The complaint was filed by Amnesty International Israel’s director Yonatan Gher, the father of two children with two dads.
“I filed a police complaint this morning for inciting violence against my children and every girl and child in Israel with a father and father, mother and mother and every other family form,” he wrote in a Facebook post that showed the complaint.
In a later statement, he added, “the children referred to in the ad “aren’t theoretical, they’re real and they exist. What do they expect will happen with the children who are living today in families like that? That they’ll disappear? Violent incidents with a homophobic background are growing in Israel, and now, thanks to Eli Yishai and his party, that violence could now be directed toward children.”
Yishai refused to denounce the campaign but said in an interview with Ynet Wednesday that he did not personally initiate the campaign.
“The ads were not publicized at my behest. However, in Jewish tradition, there is a father, a mother, children and the next generation,” he said.
Labor MK Merav Michaeli also attacked Yishai, writing on Twitter: “How fearful and hateful a person must be in order to run a campaign like this. I wonder what Yishai would say if there was a campaign so no child will have a Jewish mother and father.’ Anyone who acts against the equality of the gay community is a clear and immediate threat to the character of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state. It is forbidden to allow them to run for Knesset.”