Bill: Dock Salaries of Security-Risk MK’s

YERUSHALAYIM
MK Mickey Levy (Miriam Alster/Flash90)

The Knesset took up the issue of disciplinary measures for MK’s who are considered security risks, The Jerusalem Post reported on Sunday.

MK Mickey Levy (Yesh Atid) brought the bill to the Ministerial Committee for Legislation after the Knesset Ethics Committee rejected a demand to withhold the salary of Joint List MK Basel Ghattas, who is charged with smuggling cellphones to security prisoners in Saharonim Prison. Levy and another Yesh Atid member, Yaakov Peri, made that demand.
What Levy proposed would be an amendment to the law regulating the salaries of Knesset members. If passed, it would mean that an MK is indicted for a security offense, that MK will not receive salary until the Knesset speaker receives a court ruling or a letter from the attorney-general stating that all charges have been dropped.

The Knesset stripped Ghattas of his parliamentary immunity back in December. In January, Attorney-General Avichai Mandelblit stated that there is sufficient evidence to indict. Meanwhile, Ghattas is waiting for a hearing.

“This situation cannot go on,” said Levy.

“It is impossible for a Knesset member who betrayed the state of Israel and was indicted with state-security felonies to keep receiving a salary from the state.

In a separate case involving accusations of disloyalty, the right-wing Im Tirtzu petitioned Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit on Sunday to start a criminal investigation against MK Talab Abu Arar (Joint Arab List) for sedition and incitement.

Abu Arar reportedly called on the Palestinian Authority “to recruit the world against the Trump-Netanyahu policy that will ignite the entire region,” after last week’s summit meeting in Washington.

In Israel, the crime of sedition carries a maximum punishment of five years in prison.

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