Arab party leader shocked by atrocities

MK Mansour Abbas (Ra’am) was shocked when he saw the uncensored footage of Hamas barbarism. He said he will never forget those images.

By Aviel Schneider | | Topics: Hamas, Israeli Arabs
Ra'am party leader Mansour Abbas. Photo: Noam Revkin Fenton/Flash90
Ra'am party leader Mansour Abbas. Photo: Noam Revkin Fenton/Flash90

Mansour Abbas is the leader of the Arab party Ra’am (United Arab List) in the Knesset and was a member of the Israeli government under Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid from June 2021 to December 2022. His is a religious party described by its opponents as Islamist.

Speaking to Arabic radio station Nass, Abbas said he had seen the shocking film showing the horrors of the massacre in the Israeli kibbutzim around the Gaza Strip, and stressed: “The massacre contradicts everything we believe in, it does not represent it our Palestinian people.”

The 47-minute uncensored footage exposing the horrors of the massacre was shown in the Knesset last week and seen by more than 50 Knesset members. Abbas reportedly burst into tears during the screening and spoke to the country’s Arabic-language media about what he saw in the shocking film. “Ninety-nine percent of the film is about the unprovoked killing of civilians,” Abbas described. “You see a citizen who doesn’t threaten anyone, who doesn’t have a gun, who lies in his house or on the ground next to his car, pretending to be dead in order to be saved. He ends up murdered.”

“I saw a father with two children running into the shelter in front of his house. Then they threw a grenade into the shelter and the father jumped on the grenade and was killed,” he said, adding: “The two children were injured and survived the massacre. The murder of foreign guest workers was also shocking to me. The video is terrible.”

At the end of the interview, Abbas clarified: “The massacre was against everything we believe in, against our religion, our Islam, our nationality, our humanity. What happened there does not represent our Arab society, our Palestinian people, or our Palestinian nation.”

Abbas has recognized that what happened on that “Black Sabbath” a month ago in southern Israel cannot be compared to what is happening in the Palestinian cities of the biblical heartland of Judea and Samaria. The gun battles between Israeli soldiers and armed Palestinians are something else. These are not Palestinian civilians who are being killed by Israeli soldiers on a whim.

Iman Khatib-Yasin, on the other hand… Photo: Oliver Fitoussi/Flash90

His party colleague, the Arab Knesset member Iman Khatib-Yassin, took a different position, and was suspended by Abbas. In media interviews, she denied Hamas atrocities without having seen the film herself. However, she explained that someone told her there was no evidence of atrocities in the film. And if they actually happened, it would contradict the principles of Islam. She went on to draw moral equivalence by saying no one should forget the situation that existed prior to October 7. After her suspension, she apologized for her statement.

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One response to “Arab party leader shocked by atrocities”

  1. psalm100al says:
    November 9, 2023 at 5:22 pm

    The only person/God you can trust is the Lord Jesus Christ. Truth is fallen in the streets throughout the whole world. Come quickly Lord Jesus!

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