Police arrest 11 in Lod after far-right activists tour an Arab neighbourhood

Police arrested 11 people in Lod late on Sunday night after a confrontation involving dozens of people broke out following a march by far-right activists through an Arab part of the city. The Times of Israel, citing police, reported that those detained included a woman and a minor, and that police rejected reports that anyone had been stabbed.

Ynet reported that the far-right activist Mordechai David was in Lod and that dozens of teenagers shouted slogans against Arabs and fought with residents. A resident quoted by Ynet said the group chanted "a state of Jews" and "Ben Gvir has come", the second a reference to the far-right politician Itamar Ben Gvir.

What police said

According to a police account carried by the Hebrew news channel News.co.il, some of those taking part in a gathering of dozens began disturbing public order and ignored officers' instructions. Officers from the Lod police station, together with the Border Police, stepped in and detained the suspects, among them minors and a woman. The Border Police, known in Hebrew as Magav, is a gendarmerie arm of the Israel Police that is often deployed to contain unrest in cities. Police also said no stabbing had taken place, in response to reports circulating that evening.

The march and Mordechai David

The Times of Israel described the event as a self-styled "sovereignty march" through an Arab neighbourhood. News.co.il published an image it attributed to Mordechai David's own Instagram account, showing him on what it called a governance tour inside Lod shortly before the clashes began. A caption with the post read, in Hebrew, that the group had come to do a round of the Arabs' neighbourhoods. The term used in Hebrew, meshilut, translates roughly as governance and is used by right-wing activists to argue that the state should assert its authority in areas they regard as lawless.

None of the reports describe how many activists came from outside Lod or how the visit was organised.

The mayor's account

Lod's mayor, Yair Revivo, blamed people from outside the city. In a statement reported by The Times of Israel, he said extremists had come in to inflame the situation and were joined by about 20 boys and teenagers from a local yeshiva high school, a religious secondary school combining Torah study with general education. Revivo said that after police broke up the group, the local boys chanted insulting slogans outside Arab homes, which led to a violent fight in which, by his account, people from both communities were hurt and detained. Revivo described himself as "seething with rage", adding that the outside group left residents to deal with what followed.

Ynet quoted Revivo as saying he had no intention of letting anyone take the city back to the terrible days of Guardian of the Walls.

Why Lod is sensitive

Lod is a city in central Israel with a mixed population of Jewish and Arab residents, both groups citizens of Israel. Guardian of the Walls is the name Israel gave to a military operation against Hamas in Gaza, during which Lod became a centre of some of the worst Jewish-Arab street violence inside Israel in years. For many residents the name has become shorthand for that period, which is why the mayor invoked it.

Marches by Jewish activists through Arab neighbourhoods in mixed cities are a recurring flashpoint. Supporters present them as asserting sovereignty or public order; residents and local officials often describe them as provocation.

Where the accounts differ

The reports do not fully match. Ynet describes dozens of teenagers shouting against Arabs and brawling, while the mayor, as quoted by The Times of Israel, put the number of local youths who joined at about 20. The mayor spoke of people hurt on both sides, but the police account as reported does not mention injuries at all. Police said they intervened in a gathering that broke public order; Revivo said the confrontation escalated after police had already dispersed the group.

What the reports do not say

No report gives the number or condition of anyone injured, or identifies which side the 11 people arrested came from. Police have not said whether Mordechai David or other organisers were among those detained, and no response from him or from Arab community leaders in Lod has been reported.