Fidesz

A Hungarian court sentenced a Syrian-Cypriot man to seven years in prison for illegally crossing the border and for being an accomplice in "an act of terror" during clashes with police in September 2015, state news agency MTI reported on Wednesday.

Grinning cheerfully as he swipes his mop neatly across the glass front of an optician's shop, Sandor the window cleaner tells me he doesn't think much of Hungary's ruling Fidesz party, BBC reported.

"They may say the economy's thriving but we don't feel it," he says. "The one thing they do right is to keep the migrants out."

Hungary will hold its 2018 parliamentary election on April 8, President Janos Ader said in a statement released through state news agency MTI on Thursday, quoted by Reuters.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban's ruling Fidesz party holds a comfortable lead over the main opposition, the nationalist Jobbik party, based on the latest opinion polls. The Socialists are a distant third.

The Hungarian National Audit Office fined the main opposition party, the nationalist Yobik, with a sum of 362 million forints ($ 1.29 million) for an anti-government campaign with billboards sponsored by a wealthy adversary of Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

In a statement today, George Soros reacted for the first time to the campaign of the Hungarian government against him, saying the attacks against him contained "lies and distortions" and aimed to create a false external enemy, Reuters reported.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said that after decades of being under the control of “anti-Christian, internationalist powers” the country needs a government “based on the teachings of Christ” which “made Europe and the Hungarians great”.

A day after Israel's ambassador in Budapest called for local election billboards targeting George Soros to be removed - saying the campaign "sows hatred and fear" - Israel's Foreign Ministry weighed in, agreeing with the substance of Hungary's criticism.

MPs from Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban's Fidesz party on Tuesday approved a draft education bill.

AP is reporting that "critics say the bill targets a university founded by billionaire philanthropist George Soros."

The main opposition party in Hungary Jobbik is trying to cut ties with its past as a far-right, anti-Semitic, radical formation. It is looking for popularity and plans to fight for power against the ruling FIDESZ  party during the 2018 elections, commented to Reuters Jobbik's leader Gábor Vona.

Hungarian lawmakers on Nov. 8 blocked Prime Minister Viktor Orban's bid to change the constitution to bar the resettlement of refugees, after the radical right Jobbik party refused to support the bill.

While all 131 MPs of Orban's ruling right-wing coalition voted in favor, the bill failed to pick up an extra two votes to reach a required two-thirds majority.