Knesset committee chair slams mass surveillance measures as ‘power grab’

Blue and White MK Gabi Ashkenazi says that measures allowing security services to deploy advanced digital monitoring tools in an effort to track carriers of the coronavirus, passed by the government overnight without approval of the Knesset Defense and Foreign Affairs Committee, which he heads, amount to a “power grab” and must be subject to appropriate oversight laws.

“In the dead of night, in a power grab, the government approved the emergency regulations, even though the Defense and Foreign Affairs and Committee yesterday did not have opportunity to discuss it seriously,” Ashkenazi writes on Twitter.

“It is not appropriate that is how such measures should approved without parliamentary and public oversight,” he says.

The approval of the emergency measure bypassed the Knesset — a move Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had said would not be done — after a subcommittee on clandestine services on Monday stopped short of approving the highly controversial surveillance program, pending additional debate.

“I call to convene the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee today to hold an immediate discussion of the matter, and to exercise the supervision required by law,” Ashkenazi adds.

— Raoul Wootliff