Tens of thousands of Arab Israelis gathered in Tel Aviv to protest the country's Nation State Law, shouting "equality, equality and "Apartheid will not pass".

They gathered in Rabin Square, chating against the new law in Hebrew and Arabic and calling the Israeli government "apartheid regime", on Saturday, the second mass demonstration against the law in as many weeks.

Arab Israelis make up close to one fifth of the country's population. The Nation State Law says only Israel's Jews have the right to self-determination and declares the country the nation state of the Jewish people.

Mohammed Barake, who chairs an Arab Israeli committee that has launched a legal challenge against the law, said: "It is a racist law that reminds us of what happened in South Africa during apartheid."

Saturday's protest follows one by members of Israel's Druze minority last Saturday against the law. 

Despite the protest and five pending legal challenges, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday: "The state of Israel is the national state of the Jewish people. Israel is a Jewish and democratic state.

"Individual rights are anchored in many laws. Nobody has harmed – and nobody intends to harm – these individual rights, but without the nation-state law it will be impossible to ensure for [future] generations the future of Israel as a Jewish national state."

The law has proven controversial among Diaspora Jews. Dame Vivien Duffield, one of the UK's biggest donors to Israeli causes and charities, said the law had left her thinking "my Israel is dead".