Hadash-Ta’al MK Ayman Odeh on Wednesday decried the Knesset House Committee’s Monday vote to impeach him, calling the attempt fascist and saying it will not intimidate him.
“On the contrary, it only strengthens our determination to fight harder, Jews and Arabs together,” he said.
“We will stand firm against fascism, against Kahanism, against Jewish supremacy, against the occupation, and against all anti-democratic forces that are trying to silence us and destroy our shared society.
“We will stand firm – for equality, for freedom of expression, for democracy, for peace, and for a better future for all of us,” Odeh stressed.
The Knesset House Committee voted 14-2 to impeach Odeh in its second hearing on the subject. The necessary three-quarters of the committee voted in favor, including several opposition MKs. The first hearing was in late June.
The vote will head to the Knesset plenum, where it must receive 90 votes to pass, and even if it passes, Odeh will still have the right to appeal the decision to the High Court of Justice.
According to the quasi-constitutional Basic Law: The Knesset, an MK may be impeached for “support for armed struggle by an enemy state or terrorist organization against the State of Israel” or for “incitement to racism.”
Reasoning for impeaching Odeh
Likud MK Avichay Boaron revived the procedure to impeach Odeh in June – following a failed attempt in January – after Odeh said during a protest: “After 600 days, there is an overwhelming majority among both peoples saying: If only these 20 months had never happened. This is a historic defeat for the Right, which was defeated in Gaza. Gaza won, and Gaza will win.”
In January, Odeh posted on X/Twitter: “Happy about the release of hostages and [Palestinian] prisoners. From here, both peoples need to be freed from the burden of the occupation; we were born free.”
The impeachment was not just a response to specific statements but directed against “Odeh as a person and everything he represents,” Boaron said in his closing argument. At the end of the hearing, committee chairman Ofir Katz (Likud) said Odeh was a “bitter enemy” of Israel, and in a “normal country,” he would “rot in jail.”
Only Ra’am MK Waleed Taha and Hadash-Ta’al MK Ahmad Tibi voted against his impeachment.
Eliav Breuer contributed to this report.