Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday he supports a bill to bar the Muslim call to prayer via mosque loudspeakers.
Speaking ahead of a vote on the bill in the Ministerial Committee for Legislation the prime minister said that the blared prayer calls are a public nuisance that cuts across all religious denominations.
“The Muslims the Jews and the Christian are all suffering from this” he claimed. “I can’t tell you how many times people have approached me from all walks of Israeli society who are crying out about the suffering that is caused by excessive noise reaching them from prayer house announcements.”
The prayer calls traditionally announced through minarets five times have been a frequent target of Israeli ire with many claiming they are a loud nuisance that echoes in Jewish towns and neighborhoods.
The bill was penned by Jewish Home MK Moti Yogev. Supporters of the bill say freedom of religion should take a backseat to quality of life in this case.
Arab lawmakers attacked the proposal as a hate-fueled assault on Muslim freedom of religion.
Joint (Arab) List leader MK Aymen Odeh slammed the legislation calling it “another bill in a series of populist bills whose objective is to create an atmosphere of hate and incitement against the Arab population.”
“It’s clear that the sole purpose of the bill is to mark the mosques as a problem source. It is a clear attack on Muslim freedom of religion and the continuation of a wave of persecution that the prime minister is leading” added Odeh.
His fellow party lawmaker Hanin Zoabi suggested that those who are bothered by the calls to prayer should find somewhere else to live.
“Those who suffer from the sounds of the muezzins are specifically those who chose to settle near the mosques and… they are invited to leave if they are suffering so much” she said.
“This isn’t Europe here. Anyone who feels like he is in Europe and thinks this is Europe should consider going there” added Zoabi.
Likud MKs Miki Zohar and Nurit Koren Jewish Home MKs Bezalel Smotrich and Shuli Muallem-Refaeli and Kulanu MK Merav Ben-Ari have also endorsed the legislation.
“Hundreds of thousands of Israeli citizens — in the Galilee Negev Jerusalem Tel Aviv-Jaffa and other places in central Israel — suffer regularly and daily from the noise caused by the call of the muezzin from mosques” reads the proposed legislation.
Speaking with the PIC Preacher of the holy al-Aqsa Mosque Sheikh Akrema Sabri said the Israeli bid to ban the call to prayers is a proof that Israeli fanatics are manipulating the law to suppress Muslims’ religious freedom and step up aggressions.
He added that the call to prayers has occurred in Palestine for 15 centuries urging the Islamic states to take up their responsibilities as regards such Israeli violations of Muslims’ religious freedom.
