Israel’s Supreme Court on Tuesday ordered Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked to cease enforcing the Citizenship Law, which expired in July after the opposition refused to cooperate with the coalition in approving it. The law is an extremely important one for Israel’s security as it places strict limits on requests by Palestinians who marry Arab-Israelis for Israeli citizenship under family reunification laws.

Apart from the fact that failure to enforce the law will allow large numbers of Palestinians into Israel, children of mixed Palestinian-Israeli-Arab marriage are three times more likely to be involved in terrorism than Arabs from the general population, according to a Yisrael Hayom report based on data from 2001-2016.

Due to its vital importance to security, Shaked has continued enforcing the law despite its expiration and in response, civil rights groups filed petitions to the courts, leading to the Supreme Court’s decision.

However a solution may be in sight as on Wednesday morning, Yisrael Hayom reported that opposition members will cooperate with the coalition to pass an extension of the law. A new version of the law was drafted by Religious Zionist party MK Simcha Rothman.

“For the first time in the history of the State of Israel, there are coalition members who want to bring in Arabs from Judea and Samaria into Israel in large numbers so we must ensure that the status quo is preserved,” Rothman said.

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)