Israel’s rightwing government has become embroiled in fresh controversy, over a draft law that would ban the country’s Arab minority from commemorating the mass exodus of Palestinians from their homes and villages during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war.

The draft bill would make it a criminal offence – punishable by up to three years in prison – for Israeli citizens to mark the “Nakba”. The term means catastrophe, and is used by Palestinians to describe the year of Israel’s foundation, when between 700,000 and 800,000 of them fled or were expelled by advancing Israeli troops. It is commemorated every year on May 15, and involves demonstrations and marches to destroyed Palestinian villages inside Israel.