The Afula municipality reneged July 14 on its decision to close its municipal park to non-Afula residents, following a petition submitted by Adalah - The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel. Judge Danny Tzarfati of the Nazareth District Court made it clear to the municipality that it is illegal to close off a public place and exact payment for entrance. “Just like you don’t close off a street, you don’t close a park, without connection to the discrimination issue,” he said. Israel’s Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit joined the petition, and in the official opinion that was submitted to the court, he wrote that the decision of the Afula municipality to close the park to nonresidents, raises important questions regarding the motives behind such a decision.

The court did not address the issue of motive but restricted itself to determining that the decision to close the park was illegal. Nevertheless, the question still remains of what was behind the municipal decision to forbid entrance to nonresidents of Afula to the park. Was the welfare of the local residents at the foundation of the decision, or the desire to keep out residents of the nearby Arab localities from entering the park?

Past experience shows that the motive for closing the park was racism, pure and simple. Only last month, Afula municipality head Avi Elkabetz, his deputy Shlomo Malachi and other members of the city’s council attended a demonstration against selling a house in the city to an Arab family. The demonstrators waved flags produced by the Lehava organization, known for its racist activities against Arabs. Its chairman, Bentzi Gopstein, expressed support for burning down churches in 2015 and had also been indicted for incitement in the past.

What would be Israel’s response if the mayor of Berlin, for instance, would participate in a similar demonstration against the selling of a house in his city to a Jewish family? Wouldn’t the prime minister rush to tweet that such a demonstration is anti-Semitic with neo-Nazi overtones? He would also probably contact German Chancellor Angela Merkel and express his protests to her about the demonstration and the mayor’s attendance at such a venue.