Reuters AlertNet Full site
Homepage | Newsdesk | NGO Latest | Crisis briefings | Country profiles | MediaWatch | Jobs | Alerting | Login

NEWSDESK

Israeli minister calls anti-settler group a "virus"
19 Aug 2009 20:02:30 GMT
 Source: Reuters
JERUSALEM, Aug 19 (Reuters) - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu interrupted his summer holiday to say on Wednesday he would summon a senior minister who described left-wing opponents of Jewish settlement building as a "virus".

Netanyahu's office issued a statement after Israel's Channel 2 television broadcast video footage in which Deputy Prime Minister Moshe Yaalon was shown making the remark to a forum of Netanyahu's right-wing Likud party.

"Whenever the politicians bring us the peace dove, we as the army have to go in and clean up after them," Yaalon, a former military chief and also a minister of strategic affairs, said.

Replying to a question as to how Yaalon would "rescue" Israel, an allusion to U.S. President Barack Obama's demands to halt settlement construction in occupied land, Yaalon said:

"We are dealing again with a situation where the virus, which is Peace Now, and if you will, the elites, their damage is very great" and that Jews should be permitted to live "forever in all parts of Israel," which would include the West Bank.

Peace Now, a watchdog that lobbies against building Jewish enclaves in territory Israel captured in a 1967 war, argues it is against Israel's security interests to control Palestinians seeking a state, is often the butt of rightist criticism.

Netanyahu's office said the Israeli leader had plans to "summon Minister Yaalon for a private meeting" once he returns from vacation.

Yariv Oppenheimer, a Peace Now leader, called Yaalon's remarks "dangerous and unacceptable" and part of a "government campaign to try and delegitimise left-wing views in the eyes of Israelis."


AlertNet news is provided by
Email this article       Send comments

NGO latest

•  World Humanitarian Day: What the World Should Know
Concern Worldwide

•  DanChurchAid clears cluster bombs in Lebanon
DanChurchAid - Denmark

•  UMCOR Hotline for August 18, 2009
UMCOR - USA

•  On World Humanitarian Day, CARE asks: Why is it more dangerous to be an aid worker than a peacekeeper?
CARE International Secretariat

•  CWS emergency appeal: 2009 summer storms
CWS

MORE >>

Latest news

•  Israeli minister calls anti-settler group a "virus"

•  US recipients of Winfrey charity charged with fraud

•  Deaths, lung damage linked to nanoparticles in China

•  NASA clears shuttle Discovery to fly on Tuesday

•  Iraq forces admit lapses after blasts kill 95

MORE >>

AlertNet news is provided by

Background information

Facts & figures
Israel Palestinian territories United States of America

Related articles

Breaking stories
 Israeli minister calls anti-settler group a "virus" (1 minute ago)

US recipients of Winfrey charity charged with fraud (1 minute ago)

AlertNet insight
 G8 signals on climate change fall short - experts (1 minute ago)

Aid agency news feed
 World Humanitarian Day: What the World Should Know (1 minute ago)

Blogs
 Evicted from their homes, Palestinians live on the street in Jerusalem (1 minute ago)

Maps
 Tropical storm Claudette (1 minute ago)


Del.icio.us Del.icio.us  |   Digg Digg  |   NewsVine NewsVine  |   Reddit Reddit   
Thumb for /thefacts/imagerepository/RTRPICT/2009-08-15T184119Z_01_JER10_RTRIDSP_2_PALESTINIANS-ISRAEL-EVICTION_mainimage.jpg|/thenews/pictures/JER10.htm
Thumb for /thefacts/imagerepository/RTRPICT/2009-08-15T183000Z_01_JER09_RTRIDSP_2_PALESTINIANS-ISRAEL-EVICTION_mainimage.jpg|/thenews/pictures/JER09.htm
Thumb for /thefacts/imagerepository/RTRPICT/2009-08-14T153610Z_01_YAN02_RTRIDSP_2_PALESTINIANS-ISRAEL_mainimage.jpg|/thenews/pictures/YAN02.htm
Thumb for /thefacts/imagerepository/RTRPICT/2009-08-14T145743Z_01_JER11_RTRIDSP_2_PALESTINIANS-HAMAS-RADICALISM_mainimage.jpg|/thenews/pictures/JER11.htm
Thumb for /thefacts/imagerepository/RTRPICT/2009-08-14T143229Z_01_LBN08_RTRIDSP_2_LEBANON_mainimage.jpg|/thenews/pictures/LBN08.htm

An Israeli security guard watches as a Palestinian woman holds up her child in front of a house during a rally in Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in East Jerusalem August 15, 2009, ...


More pictures | Galleries
Disclaimers |  Copyright |  Privacy |  Contact Us |  Feedback |  About Us |  RSS XML

Last updated:Wed Aug 19 20:03:55 2009