5 Apr. (EUROPE PRESS) –
Israel Police Chief Inspector Kobi Shabtai said during a phone call with National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir that Arabs “kill each other, it’s in their nature,” according to conversations allegedly leaked by Ben Gvir himself.
In a transcript of that call, leaked to the Keshet 12 channel, Ben Gvir tries to convince the police chief to support his controversial National Guard, a 2,000-strong body that would report directly to the minister, something Shabtai has publicly rejected.
“One murder after another, he has crossed all the red lines,” Ben Gvir is reported to have said. “We need a strong National Guard,” he added.
“Mr. Minister,” Shabtai reportedly replied, “there is nothing we can do. They kill each other, it is in their nature. That is the mentality of the Arabs.”
The police chief’s office has responded in a statement, although without denying the alleged statements, expressing “astonishment to see that the minister and his office record personal conversations,” alleging that “things have been taken out of context.”
Nor have they made any comment on the speculation in the Israeli media, which suggests that it was the minister’s own office that leaked the conversations to the television network.
This week, Shabtai published an open letter warning that the proposal to create a National Guard is not only “completely unnecessary” but could lead to “disastrous consequences” for the country.
In the letter, also addressed to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Shabtai warned that “the benefits of this guard are not clear and could even cause serious operational distortions.”
