MK Ayman Odeh: 'The prime minister should apologize' for soccer comment

After Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu blamed Arab-Israelis for jeering during a moment of silence to honor victims during a soccer match, Arab MKs call foul.

MAY 7, 2018 21:13

Updated: MAY 7, 2018 21:19

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses a conference in Tel Aviv on February 14 (photo credit: REUTERS/NIR ELIAS) — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses a conference in Tel Aviv on February 14

(photo credit: REUTERS/NIR ELIAS)

A petition signed by 45 members of Knesset is calling on Prime Minister Netanyahu to apologize for claiming Arab-Israeli soccer fans did not respect moment of silence to honor youth.

"Netanyahu should apologize in public just as he incited [publicly]" said MK Ayman Odeh head of the Joint List party.

The petition, signed on Monday by 45 members of Knesset, addresses the Facebook post published by Netanyahu on April 29 in which he claimed that in a soccer match between Arab Israeli team Bnei Sakhnin and Maccabi Ra'anana Arab supporters of the first team jeered during a moment of silence in memory of the 10 killed teenagers who drowned due to flash floods in southern Israel three days before the match.

In his Facebook page, which enjoys over two million followers, Netanyahu called the alleged jeering "a disgrace" and called on Arab and Jewish public leaders to speak out against it.

However sport lovers and reporters who attended the match claim that no jeers were heard and that the Arab supporters were quiet and respectful during the moment of silence.

"All of these people said", the petition goes on to say, "that this event never happened."

The signed MK's demand that the PM publicly apologize "with a loud voice".