The Knesset Home Committee held an impeachment hearing against Hadash-Ta’al chair MK Ayman Odeh on Tuesday morning, June 24, after far-right Likud MK Avihai Boaron in recent weeks collected 70 signatures from MKs in favor of launching the procedure who received the support of opposition MKs from three Zionist parties – Yisrael Beytenu, National Unity, and Yesh Atid.

“Gaza won, and Gaza will win,” Hadash MK Ayman Odeh during the mass Jewish-Arab demonstration against war and occupation held by Partnership for Peace in Haifa, May 20, 2025 (Photo: Partnership for Peace)

Boaron initiated the process already in January, after Odeh wrote on X after Israel and Hamas agreed to a hostage deal, “Happy about the release of hostages and [Palestinian] prisoners, from here both peoples need to be freed from the burden of the occupation, we were born free.” Boaron argued at the time that the equation of the hostages and Palestinian prisoners, as well as a call to “free the burden of occupation,” constituted a “legitimization and call for violence.”

However, Boaron in January did not receive the requisite number of signatures. He revived the procedure in early June after Odeh said during a mass Jewish-Arab demonstration against war and occupation held by Partnership for Peace in Haifa, “After 600 days – there is an overwhelming majority among both peoples saying: If only these 20 months had never happened. This is a historic defeat for the Right, which was defeated in Gaza. Gaza won, and Gaza will win.”

The committee chairman, MK Ofir Katz (Likud), said Tuesday to MK Odeh: “You’re an arch terrorist. In Iran, they would have hanged and stoned you in the town square.” “While soldiers are fighting on seven fronts, the eighth front needs to be cleared, and Ayman Odeh is our eighth front,” Katz agreed in his opening remarks, implying that the Hadash lawmaker’s continued presence in the Knesset “weakens the state.” During the hearing, Katz expels MK Ofer Cassif (Hadash) and Odeh’s spokesperson, Mauricio Lapchik.  

Odeh countered, “You’re trying to silence me because I always speak to both peoples. Even my tweet was written in Hebrew and spoke about the right of both peoples to live in freedom, dignity, and equality. It is not extreme to fight for the rights of both peoples. What’s extreme is supporting a regime of Jewish supremacy—like you do.”

“This moral voice—a voice that is a global consensus—is considered extreme only in the State of Israel. I’m not the extremist here—you are,” Odeh continued. “I am proud of my position. I do not retract, I do not apologize, and I will continue to struggle, together with my partners, until we build a different future here for a better future for all of us: to live in peace, in security, in equality, and in true democracy.”

Odeh was represented by lawyer Dr. Hassan Jabareen, the General Director of Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, and during the hearing, he argues that “this procedural process is illegal and must be rejected outright. MK Odeh’s statement, which is currently at the heart of the discussion and concerns the exchange deal, is completely legal – and there is no political or legal problem with it.”

Att. Jabareen added that judicial precedent showed that the bar to impeach a Member of Knesset was even higher than the bar to open a criminal investigation, and the fact that Odeh’s post was not investigated showed that there was no basis for impeachment. Furthermore, the post did not include identifying with a terror organization nor a call for violence, Jabareen argued. He added that judicial precedent was that the sanction of impeaching an MK must be proportional, in that it must only be applied if other, less extreme means, could be used. Jabareen pointed out that on Monday, just one day before the hearing, Odeh was sanctioned by the Knesset Ethics Committee for statements accusing Israel of war crimes, and that there was no reason why the current issue could not be resolved in the Knesset Ethics Committee as well.

Both Jabareen and Odeh were repeatedly disrupted, including by comments from coalition MKs, including a call from a racist MK that Odeh needed to be “out in front of a firing squad,” Likud MK Ariel Kallner said that Odeh should say “hello to Nasrallah” (who was killed in Israeli airstrike in September), and a statement by settler Otmza Yehudit MK Limor Son Har-Melech that there was “no one innocent in Gaza.”

The Hadash lawmaker posted on X on Monday, “Tomorrow, the Knesset will try to impeach me. This is a blatant, fascist, and anti-democratic move. It only proves how deeply they fear truth and justice. But history will absolve me, and history will judge them.”

The hearing recessed without holding a vote and will continue next Monday. If the impeachment is approved in the committee, it reaches the Knesset plenum, where it must receive at least 90 votes. If impeached, the MK can appeal to the High Court. The process has never been completed before. The closest it came was in February 2024, when a measure to impeach Hadash MK Ofer Cassif reached the plenum but failed after receiving 85 votes.

According to Adalah, “This expulsion attempt is part of a broader campaign to silence and persecute Arab Palestinian political representatives and must be seen in the context of ongoing efforts to undermine their legitimacy. Just yesterday the Knesset Ethics Committee, in a separate procedure, also decided to sanction and suspend MK Odeh and MK Aida Touma-Sliman for accusing the Israeli military of committing war crimes.”

Hadash issued a statement following the Knesset Committee hearing, saying: “Comrade Ayman Odeh stood yesterday against an attempt at a political lynching — solely because of a political, humane, and responsible statement in which he called for both peoples to be freed from the injustice of the criminal occupation.”

The committee session was opened with blatant incitement by the chair, who claimed Israel was fighting on seven fronts, “and Odeh is the eighth.” Right-wing and centrist members made severe accusations against Hadash MKs, including incitement and even threats of violence, without intervention from the Legal Advisor to the Knesset — despite the advisor herself being subjected to fascist attacks by those very members.

Hadash “rejects the notion that MKs can be punished by their peers for expressing views representing the people who elected them. Odeh’s words faithfully reflect the stance of Hadash, the Arab Palestinian community in Israel and democratic Jewish forces: opposing occupation, fascism, and supremacy — and defending the right of both peoples to live on this land, and in the region as a whole, in peace and security.”

“We are not surprised that members of Yesh Atid and the National Unity Party joined the campaign of incitement — but it is our duty to warn their voters: your representatives know that Odeh will not be dismissed yet still participate in a process whose true goal is to delegitimize the Arab community, bypass the Supreme Court, and rig the next elections. In doing so, they betray those who elected them, turning their backs in a moment when a moral, clear voice is most needed. This dismissal attempt is part of a long pattern of silencing the joint Arab–Jewish voice led by Hadash— both in and outside the Knesset. We will not yield or give in. We will continue to lead the struggle for peace, equality, and democracy.”

Related: https://maki.org.il/en/?p=32782