One father loves Israel, the other hates it. Guess which one is Arab?

I was struck by the contrasting reactions of the fathers of two accused terrorists, both Israelis. One son shot up a Tel Aviv pub, murdering two and wounding seven, while the other firebombed a house killing an infant boy and his parents and severely injuring his 4-year-old brother. Both sons have records for hate crimes.

One father quickly alerted police when he suspected his son's involvement, and publicly expressed deep regrets over the incident, offering condolences to the victims and their families.  He declared his “loyalty” and “love” for Israel.

The other father insisted his son was innocent and that his confession was tortured out of him.  He denounced the State of Israel and declared his hatred for it.  He called the country's president “the fuhrer.”

The father who called on his son to surrender is an Israeli Arab who has been a volunteer with the Israeli police for more than 30 years. 

The other father, who called Israel the “most anti-Semitic country in the world,” is the ultra-Orthodox rabbi of the West Bank settlement of Karmel Zur.     

The Arab suspect in the shooting on Dizengoff Street, Nishat Milhem, 31, is still at large as of this writing. Early Tuesday, his father, who has called on his son to surrender, and five other relatives and family friends were arrested as possible accessories, but some reports suggest they were being used as bait to get Nishat to turn himself in. 

The Jew, Amiram Ben-Uliel, 21, was indicted last week for the July 31 fatal firebombing of the Dawabsha family home in the village of Duma while they slept. 

A third father sought to take political advantage of the tragedies. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, noting that his sons were about the same age as the pub shooting victims, tried to spread the blame over all Israeli Arabs and exploit the tragedy for political gain.  

Six months earlier he condemned the Duma arson as “Jewish terrorism” but dismissed the killers as “extreme and marginal, and [they] certainly don't represent religious Zionism.” 

But on Dizengoff Street this weekend the Israeli leader played his customary race card with a verbal assault on Israel's Arab citizens. 

He blamed the killings on “wild incitement of radical Islam,” and lectured one fifth of the nation's population about its responsibilities as citizens. He demanded all Arab Knesset members, “without exception…condemn the murder clearly and unequivocally.” There was no such demand of Jewish MK's after the Duma murders.

Netanyahu cemented his position as Israel's inciter-in-chief with his wholesale indictment of Israel's Arabs and dismissal of Jewish terrorists as an almost irrelevant fringe group.

In terror attacks when he was out of power, Netanyahu was quick to blame the sitting prime minister for lax security. But now that Bibi's in charge, it's always someone else's fault.

Netanyahu has that Trumpian penchant for taking credit for what works and blaming others for what goes wrong.  

Tel Aviv Mayor Ron Huldai said the PM smeared all Israeli Arabs because of his own inability to provide security.