Balad Knesset candidate eulogizes terrorist murderer, renewing scrutiny of party

Knesset member Ariel Kallner of the Likud Party said he will seek the disqualification of Balad from running in the Oct. 27 election.

By David Isaac, JNS

Hassan Nasasra, recently elected as No. 4 on the Knesset candidates list of Balad, an Arab Israeli party, eulogized the terrorist Maher Younes, who, together with a cousin, murdered IDF soldier Avraham Bromberg on the Golan in 1980.

Nasasra described Younes, who died earlier this month, as “a great national and humanitarian figure, a symbol of resilience and sacrifice, who left a deep mark on the hearts of all who knew him, and in the memory of his people and their cause.”

Defending his statements, Nasasra told Israel’s Channel 14 that “offering condolences for people who have passed is part of Islamic culture. There’s nothing wrong with it.”

He also claimed that he didn’t know Younes had served a prison sentence for murdering an IDF soldier.

Maher Younes was well-known for killing Bromberg, who was 20 at the time of this death.

Maher and his cousin Karim Younes were lionized as returning heroes by the local Arab population when they were released from prison in January 2023 after serving 40-year sentences for the murder.

Although Maher and his cousin were sentenced in 1983 to life in prison, in 2012, then-Israeli President Shimon Peres commuted their sentences to 40 years.

Each collected nearly $100,000 from the Palestinian Authority for the murder of Bromberg, part of the Palestinian Authority’s “pay-for-slay” program.

Balad has expressed support for the terrorist murderer before. When Younes was released from prison in 2023, party members participated in a reception for him, Channel 14 reported.

Knesset member Ariel Kallner of the Likud Party said he will seek the disqualification of Balad from running in the Oct. 27 election.

Praising terrorists is “a moral disgrace” and will be central to his arguments before the Central Elections Committee, he said.

Balad advocates turning Israel into a “state of all its citizens.”

It calls for the withdrawal of Israel from all of Judea and Samaria and the “right of return” for Palestinian “refugees” and their descendants, which all sides of Israel’s political spectrum agree would mean the end of the Jewish state.

The Central Elections Committee has twice disqualified Balad from running in elections.

In 2019, the committee heard testimony that then-Balad Chairman Mtanes Shehadeh was photographed with a terrorist who had thrown a grenade in Haifa and had praised former Knesset member Azmi Bishara, accused of spying for Hezbollah during the Second Lebanon War in 2006.

In 2022, the committee rejected Balad on the grounds that it opposed the existence of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state and supported armed resistance to the state.

The Israeli Supreme Court overturned the disqualifications both times.