Dani Agranat, brother of Itzik Agranat who is being held captive by Hamas in Gaza, was removed from the Knesset Constitution Committee on Monday on the orders of committee chairman MK Simcha Rothman (Religious Zionist Party), after interrupting a brother of a different hostage, who opposed the hostage deal currently being negotiated between Israel and Hamas.Rothman, along with many other committee leaders in the Knesset, tends to open committee meetings by giving the floor to family members of hostages, and intended to do so on Monday as well. However, Agranat immediately began to criticize Rothman.
Rothman said that he would not enable interruptions and would immediately remove anyone who did interrupt. He then gave the floor to Boaz Miran, brother of Omri Miran who is also captive in Gaza.
Miran, a member of the Tikva forum, which supports the government’s prioritizing the elimination of Hamas over freeing the hostages, criticized the developing hostage deal, and called it “irresponsible”.Agranat responded by saying to Rothman that the committee leader had “brought a friend,” at which point Rothman announced a recess while the Knesset guards removed Agranat. He was then removed by force, and was dragged out of the room on the floor.
The committee sessions have included much verbal sparring between members of different hostage families with differing views, and between hostage family members and Knesset members. The incident on Monday was an expression of the heightening desperation of hostage family members and the dwindling patience of MKs to give them the floor.
Additional unusual incident
Another unusual incident occurred during an earlier constitution committee session on Monday. A mother of a combat soldier, who received the floor, compared Israel’s State Attorney’s Office and the Israel Police to Hamas terrorists, due to the former’s decision to investigate the possible criminal killing of a disarmed Hamas terrorist on October 7.Rothman criticized the speaker but said that it was her right to state her opinion. However, a number of Justice Ministry officials who were present at the session, along with two MKs, Labor’s Gilad Kariv and Yesh Atid’s Yoav Segalovitz, criticized Rothman for enabling the comments.Kariv said that it was “not possible to turn this hallowed arena, that took upon itself [to allow family members of soldiers] to speak, into a free pass for anyone to say anything.” Kariv and Segalovitz then left the room in protest.The incidents came after increasing claims in recent weeks that the constitution committee was resuming controversial bills linked to the government’s 2023 judicial reforms, which caused widespread social strife.These include, for example, a law that would give the Knesset the power to appoint an ombudsman for the judicial system, which critics say will politicize the ombudsman’s institution and thus harm public trust in his or her objectivity.Rothman’s committee was a central venue during the judicial reforms debates during 2023, and Rothman was criticized for his style of managing the debates.