Rivlin lashes into MK suspension bill

President Reuven Rivlin has come out against a proposed bill to suspend or depose Knesset members over unethical behavior if 90 lawmakers vote to do so, saying it places too much power in the hands of the parliamentarians.

“The law to depose a Knesset member oversteps the reality that the Knesset is representative of the sovereign, not the sovereign itself, and places the elected above the public,” he says at a book launch.

“We cannot allow the Knesset, whose representatives are chosen by the public, to independently overturn the public’s choices. …The Knesset cannot be allowed, as a legislative body, to become judge and jury.”

Rivlin also condemns the behavior of three Joint (Arab) List MKs who visited the families of terrorists — which sparked the drive for the bill — and accuses them of “spitting in the face of the Israeli public.”

But he calls on the attorney general, and not lawmakers, to decide whether they need to be punished.

“Heaven help us if the Knesset is the one to sit in judgment,” he says.