Peres blasts Israeli right-wing

Israeli President Shimon Peres attacked ruling right-wing party’ politicians who proposed a controversial new draft law banning mosques from Adhans (call for prayer) in Arab towns (48 of Palestine). Peres said that "there is a group of insane politicians in Israel who propose projects without thinking", stating angrily: “What do they want? To wage war on the Islamic world?” adding “we have lived here for a hundred years, and we hear Adhans all the time, so what happened now?” Six Knesset MPs proposed the draft law to the  government. The Ministerial Committee of Legislation, headed by Minister of Justice Yaakov Neeman, decided to hold a meeting on Sunday after the governmental meeting. The committee will discuss what is now called the “Mosque Law”, which would include muting speakers of Adhans in all mosques in the country. The draft includes banning speakers during Adhans. All six Knesset members are from the ruling coalition parties: they are Anastasia Michaeli and Vaineh Kircnbaum from Yisrael Beiteinu, led by Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman; Tzipi Hutobala, Yaakov Katz, and Miri Regev from Likud, led by PM Benjamin Netanyahu; and Zebulun Orlev from The Jewish Home Party. They justified their proposal of the draft law saying it would “prevent harm caused by the noise,” claiming that hundreds of thousands of Israelis in Galilee, Negev, and Jerusalem  “suffer daily from the noise of the Adhans in mosques”. Proponents of the law claimed that “the noise resulting from using speakers interrupts the sleep of citizens several times a day, especially in the early hours of dawn,” adding that “freedom of religion does not mean affecting the quality of life and causing others inconvenience, thus speakers must be banned in calling prayers or delivering religious speech.” MP Mohamed Baraka, head of Democratic Front for Peace and Equality, commented on the law saying “Arab citizens in Israel, who raise Adhans from manarets and ring bells in churches, are the people of this country and its owners. Those who are irritated are the ones who came to us, they confiscated our lands and villages and cities, setting up Jewish towns on the remains of ours, and today they have the audacity to announce that they are irritated by us!” The Islamic movement in Israel considered the proposal of the law to be “waging an open war on Islam,” emphasising that the Adhan will remain.