The Knesset Regulating committee on Monday passed a resolution according to which it, as well as the Knesset committee, can hold meetings on matters under its domain without the approval of the Consents Committee. The meaning of this decision is that both committees could now debate Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s immunity request without the consent of Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein (Likud).
According to the proposal, which was passed by 16 members with one opposed, MK Shlomo Karai (Likud), the Regulating committee and the Knesset Committee may hold meetings on matters under their domain, without the approval of the Consent committee, but general discussions on government oversight, agenda proposals from plenary and legislative and sub-legislative hearings will require the approval of the Speaker of the Knesset, after receiving an opinion from the Knesset legal counsel.
Knesset Likud faction chairman MK Mickey Zohar said at the opening of the hearing that “there is no permit to hold this meeting” and was consequently removed from the meeting, shouting, “You must ask for a written permission from the Speaker of the Knesset.”
Zohar was allowed to return to the hearing, but then things heated up and most Likud MKs stormed out furiously.
MK Zohar later announced that “there is no precedent for this discussion. I declare that we will petition the High Court. No democracy in the world has changed the rules of the electoral process during a vacation. They are turning the Knesset into an election campaign for the MKs in the majority.”
Some members reminded Zohar that he, too, had been known to use his side’s majority to push his own election goals, such as in the case of approving cameras at voting places last term.