The Knesset Committee headed by MK Yoav Kish approved Wednesday the request of the Attorney General to rescind MK Basel Ghattas’s immunity facilitating his arrest on charges of smuggling cellular phones to Palestinian security prisoners.
The committee’s decision will be brought to Knesset vote on Thursday after which police will be able to make a search and arrest MK Ghattas in order to continue with the investigation.
Arab MK Ghattas did not take part in the meeting saying that it was a “political discussion whose outcome was known from the outset.”
Kish opened the discussion by claiming: “At the end of this vote every MK will know that his immunity cannot be used as a weapon to harm Israeli democracy.”
Kish added that “Ghattas made an attack on Arab-Israeli relations embarrassed the Knesset and belittled the immunity of Knesset members which is a significant aspect of Israeli democracy.”
Spokesman for the Israeli prison service told Agence France-Presse that prison guards found cellular phones held by two detainees in the Israeli Ktziot jail following a visit paid by MK Ghattas.
However MK Ghattas firmly denied the allegations.
