As more Jewish homes firebombed in Lod, Jewish resident tells Arab lawmakers: ‘Where were you when they tried to kill my family?’
By Yakir Benzion, United With Israel
More Molotov cocktails were hurled at Jewish homes in the city of Lod Thursday evening as calls by Jewish residents to Arab members of Knesset to reign in Arab arsonists apparently fell on deaf ears.
Several firebombs were thrown at Jewish homes in the mixed population Jewish-Arab city, but no injuries or serious damages were reported.
“This is a terrorist attack aimed at harming Jewish residents,” Lod Mayor Yair Revivo told Kan News.
Earlier Thursday, Lod resident Rina Bloch attended a meeting of the Special Committee on Arab Society Affairs in the Knesset, Israel’s parliament. However, the meeting descended into a shouting match as participants tried to get Arab lawmakers to discuss the Arab riots that wreaked havoc on the city earlier this month.
Jewish residents of the city had tried to get the Arab members of Knesset to take action to prevent further attacks by Arabs in the city on their Jewish neighbors.
“It is impudence that an entire committee of Arab Knesset members is sitting and saying that the demonstrations and protests in Lod were legitimate and the police are guilty of excessive arrests and force,” Bloch told Arutz Sheva following the meeting.
“These were not demonstrations but riots in which they tried to kill Jews. They shot at us, threw Molotov cocktails and stones at us and shouted ‘Itbah al-Yahud (slaughter the Jew),'” Bloch said.
In the riots in Lod, Jewish resident Yigal Yehoshua (56), was killed by an Arab lynch mob who hit him in the head with a brick and then beat him. As a result of the riots, dozens of Jewish families were forced to evacuate their homes in the city, many of which were torched by Arab arsonists along with several synagogues.
“Where were you when they sought to murder me and my family? You will not call this an assassination attempt. You cannot call the attempted murder that my family and I went through a ‘legitimate demonstration,'” Bloch said to former Arab MK Iman Khatib Yasin who was at the meeting.
With the Hamas terror group urging Israeli Arabs to rise up violently, Bloch said residents were worried about their safety over the coming days.
“I do not know how we will get through this coming Friday where a demonstration that Hamas called on Arab residents to take part in is supposed to take place,” Bloch said. “I am very worried and hope that the police will bring a presence here and we will feel the security returning to the city of Lod.”
According to police data, 348 suspects have been arrested recently, many of them in Arab localities, Ynet reported. Since the beginning of the riots a total of 1,938 people have been arrested and 175 criminal indictments have been issued.