Zahalka disagreed. He told Al Jazeera: "If you see a gun in the first act, you know it will be used in the last act. And so with this law. When we have the next 'emergency' or the next war, Jewish MKs -- even those who now criticize the law -- will rally to expel those who are outside the consensus."
Zoabi has found herself repeatedly rounded on by almost all the Jewish parties in the Knesset.
In the summer of 2014, during a major Israeli attack on Gaza, the Knesset's ethics committee suspended her for a record six months -- the longest period then allowed.
During an Israeli radio interview, she had criticized Palestinians behind the abduction of three Israeli youths in the occupied West Bank, but refused to call them "terrorists." The Israelis were later found dead.
Zahalka said Palestinian MKs now faced an "extraordinary" situation. "In every country, parliamentary immunity confers on legislators greater rights than ordinary citizens to help them carry out their parliamentary duties," he said. "Only in Israel will elected representatives have more restricted freedom of speech and action than ordinary citizens."
The expulsion law follows the outlawing last year of the northern Islamic Movement, the largest extra-parliamentary movement among the Palestinian minority in Israel. Its head, Sheikh Raed Salah, is considered a spiritual leader to a large section of the community.
At the time, Netanyahu hinted that the Islamic Movement was linked to "terror" activity. Leaks from government ministers to the Haaretz newspaper, however, revealed that the Israeli security services had found no such ties.
Zeidan observed that the Israeli right had been waging a battle to rid the Knesset of Palestinian parties for some time.
Over the past 15 years, the Central Elections Committee, which is dominated by Jewish parties, has repeatedly tried to ban Palestinian MKs from standing for election. However, the Israeli Supreme Court overturned the decisions on appeal.
In 2014, the government tried a different route. It passed a Threshold Law, raising the proportion of votes needed to win a place in the Knesset. The threshold was set too high for the four small Palestinian parties to clear it.
The move, however, backfired. The parties responded by forming the Joint List and became one of the largest blocs in the Knesset after last year's general election.
It was in this context, noted Zeidan, that on the eve of the election, Netanyahu made his much-criticized comment warning that "Arabs are coming out in droves to the polls."
Asad Ghanem, a politics professor at Haifa University, told Al Jazeera that the expulsion law might realize for Netanyahu his stated goal of discouraging participation by the Palestinian electorate. Turnout had fallen to barely more than half of the minority's voters before the Joint List's creation in time for the 2015 election.
"If we see these attacks on Arab representation in the Knesset continue," Ghanem said, "then voters may conclude that enough is enough and that it is time to withdraw from the political game."
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