Netanyahu defends Knesset closure: ‘The last thing I would do is harm democracy’

Netanyahu defends Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein’s decision to shutter the plenary, saying he hopes the parliament reopens soon.

Earlier today, Edelstein ordered the Knesset shut after the Blue and White party refused his proposal of having equal representation in the parliamentary so-called Arrangements Committee, which is tasked with presiding over the creation of all other Knesset committees, as the Likud-led coalition garnered 59 seats in the last election to the Blue and White’s coalition’s 61.

“Committees were always formed with agreement between the coalition and opposition,” Netanyahu says in a Channel 12 interview.

The closure of the Knesset has led to a total lack of parliamentary oversight in the transitional government’s recent, occasionally draconian measures that it says are necessary to combat the coronavirus, which has included the closure of many of the nation’s courts — another major check on executive overreach.

“The last thing I would do is harm democracy,” Netanyahu says.

The prime minister says he hopes the Knesset reopens soon.

Asked specifically about a recent mass surveillance program approved by the government without any parliamentary oversight, the he denied wrongdoing, arguing that he had wanted the approval of a Knesset’s committee, but was forced to act quickly.

“I demanded the maximum oversight on this. The concerns of bad use of this data are not on only one side of the political map,” he says.

Netanyahu adds that he has refrained from using mass surveillance against Israeli citizens in the past “in order to defend the individual. I protected them.”

The prime minister also falsely claims that the Blue and White party’s efforts to form a minority government are unprecendented in the democratic world. There have been minority governments — in which the ruling coalition requires support from outside factions — in Ireland, Canada, the United Kingdom, Norway, Sweden, Denmark and others.