During a heated session of the Constitution Committee, MK Yasmin Fridman (Yesh Atid) snatched a coffee cup from committee chair MK Simcha Rothman (Religious Zionism) that bore the inscription 'Attorney General is impeachable.' Rothman responded: 'It cannot be that in a democratic state there is a clerk, at any level, who cannot be impeached. She sabotages every step of the government.' The incident was reported by Knesset Channel 14.
On Monday, a new confrontation broke out in the Knesset Constitution Committee when MK Yasmin Fridman (Yesh Atid) snatched a coffee cup from committee chair MK Simcha Rothman (Religious Zionism) that bore the inscription 'Attorney General is impeachable.' Rothman responded, according to Knesset Channel 14, that no official should be immune from impeachment. The incident comes one day after the same MKs had apparently resolved a prior dispute over the same cup.
The thread began on Sunday at 11:56 Jerusalem, when The Zioneer reported that Rothman had displayed a cup reading 'Attorney General — can be fired' during the final committee discussion on the bill to weaken the attorney general. Minutes later, an unverified claim emerged that Fridman had taken the cup from Rothman's desk. By the same time, a compromise was reported by Amit Segal (N12): a second cup belonging to Fridman had been placed alongside Rothman's, ending the earlier clash. The level of corroboration rose from a single unverified source to an on-record report by N12.
The cup dispute is unfolding against the backdrop of the Constitution Committee's advancement of the bill to split the office of the Attorney General, a proposal that has drawn sharp opposition from the legal establishment. In a separate incident on June 30, The Zioneer reported that Rothman expelled Deputy Attorney General Gil Limon from a committee session for interrupting a colleague's speaking time.
It remains unclear whether the new snatching incident will lead to any disciplinary action or further escalation between the two MKs. The prompt for Rothman's renewed display of the inscription — and the precise circumstances of the snatching — have not been independently verified.
4 developments
- DevelopingMK Simcha Rothman responds to opposition criticism in Knesset committee
- DevelopingKnesset MK Rothman blows up two committee meetings, threatens to block opposition legislation
- ConfirmedConstitution Committee chair Rothman expels deputy AG Gil Limon from hearing on AG split bill
- DevelopingConstitutional committee debate turns tense as MK Oz Haim calls proposed law 'poisoned' — Rothman cuts off 'demagoguery'
Source and signal
- Internal intake