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Barak blames Israeli Arab leaders for October riots Former prime minister Ehud Barak blamed the political leadership of the Israeli Arab community for the outbreak of the October 2000 riots, accusing it of trying 'to use the democratic process to undermine the foundations of the state.' Barak, who testified for the second day before the Or Commission of Inquiry into the riots in with 13 Arabs were killed, rejected the commission's hypothesis that the riots broke out because he failed to hold an interministerial meeting to discuss the problems of Israeli Arabs. 'The real factor [that led to the riots] is the existence of a group within the Israeli Arab leadership which is leading toward hostility,' he said. He repeated the charge two more times during his five-hour testimony. 'The Arab leadership, including the political leadership, is interested in putting things this way. We are coping with a very problematic phenomenon, an effort to use the democratic process to undermine the foundations of the state. They call for a binational state, which will end up as a state with a Jewish minority.' Later on, he described MK Azmi Bishara (Balad) as 'a very smart man who knows what to do and what not to do to achieve his ends.' Only once in two days of testimony did Barak admit to any personal feelings of distress regarding the commission's decision to send him a warning letter. 'I have felt very deep disappointment from the day I was informed that I am being warned about something that I know to be the opposite of what happened,' he said, referring to the allegation that he had ordered the Wadi Ara highway opened at all costs. The head of the commission, Supreme Court Justice Theodore Or, pressed him hard on this issue, which led to the deaths of two Umm el-Fahm residents. 'It should have been clear to everyone that it would not be possible to keep the road open without clashes, especially when mourners were streaming to Umm el-Fahm from all over the country to participate in the funerals,' he said. Barak rejected the commission's proposition that he should have known the riots would be worse than anything that had preceded them. He said there have been three milestones in the history of the relations between the state and its Arab citizens, and each of them heralded a new reality. The first was the Kafr Kasim incident in 1956, in which more than 50 Arab villagers returning from work after curfew were shot to death. The second was the first Land Day observance in 1976, when seven Arabs were killed. The October riots marked the third, he said.
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