Israel’s Central Election Committee voted on Wednesday to ban Labor candidate Ibtisam Mara’ana from running in the March elections in response to a petition by Otzma Yehudit chairman Itamar Ben-Gvir.

Mara’ana can still appeal the ban to the Supreme Court, which is almost certain to overturn the decision, based on similar cases in the past.

A Labor member who was badly injured during his IDF service also filed a petition against Mara’ana but later withdrew it.

Mara’ana, an Israeli-Arab filmmaker from Yafo married to an Israeli Jew, has made numerous anti-Israeli and anti-IDF statements and boasted on social media about ignoring the memorial siren on Yom HaZicharon.

Mara’ana, who is number seven on the Labor list, called Israel an “ugly” country on social media and claimed that IDF soldiers from the “occupation army” murdered an Arab child. She also called for the destruction of Zichron Yaakov, a town near Haifa.

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)