Coalition prepares to set up special panel to advance stormy media regulation bill

The Knesset House Committee is set to discuss the establishment of a special panel meant to advance a controversial media regulation bill spearheaded by Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi. The House Committee is headed by Likud MK Ofir Katz, the coalition whip.

The session on Monday is meant to sidestep fellow Likud MK David Bitan, who has expressed opposition to the bill in its current form. He chairs the Economic Affairs Committee, which usually deals with media-related legislation.

The committee, if it becomes a reality, is set to be headed by a third Likud MK, Galit Distel Atbaryan, a firebrand lawmaker who has also backed legislation targeting the existing media landscape.

The ad hoc committee would advance the bill — which would give the government significant control over broadcast media, news sites and other media — to its final votes in the Knesset ahead of passage. The measure is one of several proposed by the government that takes aim at legacy media, which Karhi, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and others in the coalition have accused of having a left-wing bias.

Bitan, in an interview over the weekend with Channel 12, treated the establishment of the ad hoc committee as a fait accompli, saying Netanyahu had given it a green light. But he portrayed Karhi’s maneuver as an affront to the democratic process.

“The chairman of the coalition informed me that the prime minister decided, in the end, to establish the committee,” Karhi said, referring to Likud MK Ofir Katz. “He’s allowed to make that decision, and I’m allowed to disagree. We’ll deal with the issue.”

He added, “There are some ministers who want a committee that is convenient for them; this is a cheapening of the Knesset and a cheapening of democracy.”

Karhi’s bill was advanced in an initial vote in the Knesset earlier this month. It would give the government significant control over broadcast media, news sites and other media by replacing existing oversight mechanisms with a new regulatory council, with a majority of members chosen by the communications minister.

The new committee, called the Council for the Regulation of Audio-Visual Content, would be granted vast authorities, including the ability to cancel the registrations of media outlets and issue hefty fines.

Attorney General Galit Baharav-Miara, who has clashed frequently with cabinet ministers over their efforts to change government institutions, has criticized the bill and withheld legal approval from its text.

Baharav-Miara has said the bill would enable “political interference in the work of broadcast bodies and endanger the free press in Israel.” She also criticized the legislation for removing a guardrail between news reporting and media outlets’ commercial interests.

יחד נשנה את מפת התקשורת בישראל. בקרוב בעז״ה. pic.twitter.com/RuUY7GVoeS

— ????????שלמה קרעי – Shlomo Karhi (@shlomo_karhi) November 29, 2025

But Karhi is vowing to press forward with the bill, praising it alongside his other attempts to reform the media. He has advanced or passed legislation to shutter the Qatar-based Al Jazeera in Israel, close down Army Radio, and benefit Channel 14, a pro-Netanyahu outlet.

In a video published Saturday night, Karhi boasted that he is “changing the media in Israel.”

“In the coming days, with God’s help, the special committee for broadcast reform will be established,” he said. “And together, with God’s help, we will break the left’s monopoly over the public consciousness.”