Liberman mourns the loss of his party's former Knesset member, who died of a heart attack.
By LAHAV HARKOVFormer Yisrael Beytenu MK David Rotem(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)
Former Yisrael Beytenu MK David Rotem died of a heart attack Monday at age 66 in his home in Efrat, leaving behind a wife and five children.His funeral will take place Monday at 5 p.m. at the Central Synagogue in the Hageffen neighborhood of Efrat, and then the cemetery in Kfar EtzionRotem was a lawmaker from 2007-2015 who was known for the sharp barbs he directed at opposing MKs. He served as chairman of the Knesset Law, Constitution and Justice Committee and a member of the judicial appointment committee. He pushed the last government's electoral reform bill into law in 2014.The MK retired from politics in January and became a member of the Shaarei Tzedek Medical Center's board of directors.Rotem was born in 1949 in Bnei Brak and grew up in Jerusalem. He had polio as a child and was not conscripted to the IDF, but after completing law school, he volunteered as a reservist in the military prosecution until the Oslo Accords were signed in 1993. He was also the Yesha Council's legal adviser and a lecturer at Bar-Ilan University.Yisrael Beytenu chairman Avigdor Liberman said Rotem was "a man of the Land of Israel who knew how to fight for his land and for his opinions, a man who was not afraid to stand up for himself and was not deterred from battles to promote what he believed in."Liberman said Rotem contributed much to Israel and to his party, and he is a loss to all.Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein paid tribute to Rotem in the Knesset, saying "he was one of the hardest-working and esteemed MKs, and an active and influential lawyer for Judea, Samaria and Gaza."
