PHOTOS: Hundreds Hold Counter Demonstration In Support Of Planned Deportation

(PHPTOS IN EXTENDED ARTICLE)

As left-wing protestors gathered to rally against the government’s planned deportation of illegal African migrants, hundreds of residents from South Tel-Aviv and activists from the Zionist organization Im Tirtzu staged a counter demonstration in support of the deportation.

The counter demonstration was held in the memory of Esther Galili, a 70-year-old resident of South Tel-Aviv and Holocaust survivor who was beaten to death by an illegal migrant exactly eight years earlier on February 24, 2010.

Activists held signs reading “Residents of South Tel-Aviv also Deserve Human Rights” and “Illegal Migrants – not Refugees,” and labelled the effort to keep the migrants in Israel a “deceitful campaign orchestrated by the anti-Israel New Israel Fund and carried out by far-Left Israeli NGOs.”

Sheffi Paz, leader of “The South Tel Aviv Liberation Front,” said that the protest in support of the illegal migrants was a “show of hatred for the residents of South Tel-Aviv.”

“On the day marking the murder of Esther Galili, radical left-wing groups are holding a protest under the guise of helping the residents of South Tel-Aviv,” said Paz. “But they are not for South Tel-Aviv. They don’t even know South Tel-Aviv.”

“For us residents of South Tel-Aviv,” continued Paz, “our sense of security has been robbed, our community has been lost, and our personal freedoms have been taken. Now they are trying to steal our identity and take the one thing we have left.”

Alon Schvartzer, Director of Policy for Im Tirtzu that has been assisting the residents of South Tel-Aviv in their efforts, said: “Today we see once again who is working on behalf of the residents of South Tel-Aviv and who is working against them.”

“The time has come for the New Israel Fund and their radical-Left allies to stop harassing Israeli society and the residents of South Tel-Aviv. We are calling desicion makers to stand up for a Jewish and democratic Israel and to not cave into this deceitful campaign.”