Knesset Committee Hearing Today, 24 June, on Attempt to Expel Arab MK Ayman Odeh

Today, 24 June 2025, the Knesset Committee will hold a hearing to consider a request to expel Member of Knesset (MK) Ayman Odeh, the head of the Jabha/Hadash political party, from the Knesset. The committee hearing, following complaints filed by Likud MK Avichai Boaron, will focus solely on a single social media post in which MK Odeh expressed his support for the implementation of the Hamas-Israel prisoner-hostage exchange in January. Adalah’s General Director, Dr. Hassan Jabareen who represents MK Odeh in the proceedings, views this move as a serious escalation in the ongoing campaign to crack down on the freedom of expression and political participation rights of Arab political representatives and Palestinian citizens of Israel as a whole. 

The scheduled hearing follows a decision by the Knesset's legal advisor that it can only address one statement by MK Odeh, and that additional complaints filed are procedurally flawed and cannot be heard, primarily as they lack the required number of signatories to initiate an expulsion process. This decision came after Adalah sent an urgent letter on 12 June 2025 demanding the cancellation of the hearing, arguing that the request to disqualify MK Odeh fails to meet the procedural and substantive requirements of the Basic Law: The Knesset, and amounts to an unlawful, politically motivated, and discriminatory process.

 The Expulsion Law: A Parliamentary Tool to Target Palestinian Political Representatives

This disqualification attempt relies on the “Expulsion Law,” enacted in 2016 as Amendment No. 44 to the Basic Law: The Knesset. According to this law, a three-quarters majority of Knesset members (90 out of 120) may remove a sitting MK on two grounds: 1) incitement to racism, and 2) support for an armed struggle against the State of Israel. Expulsion proceedings may only begin after 70 MKs submit a request to the Knesset Speaker, including at least 10 MKs from the opposition. The Knesset House Committee must then vote on whether to proceed; a three-fourths majority is required to move forward. If the committee supports expulsion, the Knesset plenum must vote on the matter. In a 2016 petition to the Israeli Supreme Court challenging the constitutionality of the Expulsion Law, Adalah and the Association for Civil Rights in Israel argued that if upheld, the law will be used as a tool for ideological persecution of the minority by the majority. The law opens the door to majoritarian control of the Knesset, by creating a situation in which MKs can oust their colleagues for virtually any politically-motivated reason and without any substantive process. The Supreme Court upheld the law in a 2018 decision.

CLICK HERE read more about the Supreme Court’s dismissal of the petition 

Grounds for MK Odeh’s Expulsion Attempt

The current request to disqualify MK Odeh is based on a single social media post, in which he expressed his position on the prisoner exchange deal and voiced hope for ending the Israeli occupation. As Adalah will argue before the committee, the post falls well within constitutionally-protected political expression. 

Political Attempt to Undermine the Legitimacy of MK Ayman Odeh and Palestinian Representation in the Knesset

While Adalah stresses that the “Expulsion Law” is illegitimate at its core, even under the law’s own provisions, the procedure against MK Ayman Odeh is both procedurally and substantively unfounded: it fails to meet basic legal standards, targets speech protected by free expression, and amounts to targeted persecution aimed at silencing and discrediting MK Odeh and his positions rejecting the occupation

The complaint alleges that a single social media post by MK Odeh constitutes support for armed struggle against the State of Israel However, as Adalah will argue before the committee, even if the Knesset Committee sees the need to discuss these preposterous and baseless allegations, the request does not meet the necessary legal standards. Israeli Supreme Court rulings set a high evidentiary bar for such claims, which in this case falls far short of meeting; previously, the Court has ruled that calls for the release of Palestinian prisoners do not amount to support for armed struggle. Rather, Odeh’s statement clearly reflects a call to end violence—a position he has consistently expressed. Furthermore, court precedents require a critical mass of credible evidence to justify expulsion, yet the committee will consider only this single post. 

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, as reported in the media, 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.