Knesset lifts immunity of Arab MK accused of smuggling phones to terrorists
Police prepare to search Basel Ghattas’s home, office; lawmaker says he has ‘total faith in my innocence, because I have nothing to hide’
The Knesset formally accepted Thursday an Arab lawmaker’s waiving of his parliamentary immunity amid allegations he smuggled cellphones and coded messages to convicted Palestinian terrorists in an Israeli prison.
Following the move, MK Basel Ghattas was summoned by the Israel Police for additional questioning. Police sources said there were no immediate plans to arrest Ghattas, but searches are planned for his home and office, according to Channel 2.
In an interview Thursday with the A-Shams Arabic-language radio station, Ghattas accused police of “leading and managing a warped media campaign against me. I didn’t commit any crime.”
Ghattas, a member of the Balad Palestinian nationalist party and part of the Joint (Arab) List faction in the Knesset, was questioned on Tuesday over suspicions that he had smuggled as many as a dozen cellphones to terrorists serving time in Ketziot Prison south of Beersheba. Police screened Ghattas video surveillance footage allegedly showing him handing envelopes containing the items to prisoners during his visits.
According to Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit, who formally asked Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein to begin the process to rescind the MK’s immunity on Wednesday, Ghattas acknowledged to police that he had handed over the envelopes and notes, and admitted he knew that doing so was forbidden, but said he did not actually know what the envelopes contained and believed the notes to be Balad party pamphlets.
After the first round of questioning, police were prevented from continuing to investigate the case due to Ghattas’s immunity.
On Wednesday, Edelstein formally asked the Knesset House Committee to recommend lifting that immunity, a necessary step before a full plenum vote that would have stripped the lawmaker of the protection.
But before MKs could hold the plenum vote Thursday afternoon, Edelstein announced in the hall that Ghattas had just waived his immunity of his own accord. Under the Parliamentary Immunity Law, Ghattas’s immunity was formally lifted with Edelstein’s announcement.
In a Thursday video message to his supporters in Arabic, Ghattas was dismissive of the allegations.
“This immunity is yours, I give it back to you,” he said, apparently referring to the Knesset.
He added, “I waive this immunity out of total faith in my innocence, because I have nothing to hide. I will answer any question they ask me. I repeat that I did not commit any crime against what is called ‘state security.'”
In his announcement to the Knesset, Edelstein chastised leaders of the Arab community for not speaking out on the case.
“Speaking personally, in recent days a voice has been missing, the voice of the representatives of the Arab public. I would expect to hear their representatives, but their voices were not heard. I urge my colleagues, take to your keyboards and microphones and say something to a community that is waiting to hear from you,” he said.
Knesset House Committee Chair MK Yoav Kisch said the committee’s unanimous recommendation to rescind the immunity Wednesday “does not accuse an entire community.”
Channel 2 reported Thursday night that yet another smuggled cellphone was discovered in the cell of a Palestinian terror convict in Nafha Prison in the south.
