Amichai Eliyahu, Israel’s heritage minister and head of the Jewish Power (Otzma Yehudit) party, says Israel must “wipe out” the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan.
– The so-called month of Ramadan must be wiped out, and our fear of this month must also be wiped out, he declared in an interview with Israeli Army Radio.
How this would work in practice is somewhat unclear, but Eliyahu has previously been in hot water for arguing that the use of nuclear weapons on the Gaza Strip was “one of the possibilities”.
Even by Israeli standards, Eliyahu is a controversial figure, as he strongly opposes a two-state solution and explicitly supports Israel’s full annexation of the West Bank. He believes that Gaza should also become Israeli.
He has also claimed that the Israeli military and police have adopted the “Palestinian worldview” and is frequently antagonizing Israeli settlers and called for the execution of Palestinian prisoners.
However, when he advocated a nuclear strike on Gaza and declared his support for the expulsion of the entire Palestinian population from the territory, he was harshly criticized both internationally and domestically, and his remarks were described as a “horrifying and insane remark” by former Israeli prime minister Yair Lapid. Current prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu also distanced himself from the remarks, which Eliyahu himself later claimed were “metaphorical”.
We are now in Gaza and Israel witnessing not only massive loss of human life but also huge loss of humanity.
— Jan Eliasson (@JanKEliasson) March 4, 2024
“We are now in Gaza and Israel witnessing not only massive loss of human life but also huge loss of humanity”, comments Jan Eliasson, former Swedish Foreign Minister and UN Deputy Secretary General.
