CBNNews.com - BAGHDAD, Iraq - An Iraqi parliamentarian has been severely chastised for a recent trip to Israel, where he attended a counter-terrorism conference.

Mithal al-Alusi, a Sunni Arab who heads Iraq's Democratic Party, came to Israel last week to participate in a meeting in Herzliya on a joint intelligence network with Israel and the United States.

"In Israel, there is no occupation, there is liberalism," Alusi told participants at the Herzliya conference.

Upon his return to Iraq, lawmakers lifted his parliamentary immunity, banned him from legislative sessions and forbid him to leave the country.

Osama al-Nujeif and Haider al-Ibadi called al-Alusi's trip to Israel illegal and humiliating to Iraqis, who view Israel as an historical enemy.

In September 2004, al-Alusi attended a counter-terrorism conference in Israel. In 2005, terrorists murdered his two sons, aged 22 and 30, ostensibly to repay him for visiting Israel.

"[Terrorists] will try to kill more. They will try to stop us. It should give us more power to continue, to believe in ourselves," al-Alusi told The Jerusalem Post after his sons were killed.

Source: The Jerusalem Post