FM defiant after c'tee reprimand for boycotting Tibi

Ethics C'tee rebukes Liberman for telling ministers in his party to boycott Parliamentary Inquiry on Integration of Arab Employees.

By LAHAV HARKOV
The Knesset Ethics Committee strongly reprimanded Foreign Minister and Yisrael Beytenu chairman Avigdor Liberman on Tuesday for telling ministers in his party to boycott the Parliamentary Inquiry on the Integration of Arab Employees in the Public Sector.
However, Liberman remains defiant, saying he will continue to snub the inquiry committee.
MK Ahmed Tibi (United Arab List-Ta’al), chairman of the parliamentary inquiry, complained to the Ethics Committee about Liberman, presenting it with a newspaper clipping quoting the foreign minister as saying: “I asked all of the ministers to stop cooperating with Ahmed Tibi’s parliamentary inquiry... [because] Tibi remains quiet about the genocide in Syria.”
Tibi pointed out that Basic Law: Knesset requires ministers to appear before parliamentary inquiries.
In response, Liberman said Tibi attacked the Ethics Committee in the plenum in January, and is now using the forum “to attack others and try to save the unnecessary committee that he heads.”
In addition, Liberman referred to a letter by Yisrael Beytenu faction chairman Robert Ilatov, asking to disband the Parliamentary Inquiry on the Integration of Arab Employees in the Public Sector.
“Tibi did not fulfill his parliamentary responsibility and did not finish the investigation,” Liberman said. “He turned the inquiry into a cow he’s milking for his own narrow political needs and a platform for incitement against the State of Israel.”
The foreign minister added that Tibi’s complaint was an attempt to save his committee.
The Ethics Committee said that ministers must cooperate with Knesset committees, including inquiries.
“Not only is he disobeying a Basic Law, the Ethics Committee thinks Liberman is disrespecting the Knesset and its members, and is violating Knesset ethics,” the committee wrote.
The committee strongly reprimanded Liberman, saying he and all Yisrael Beytenu ministers must cooperate with every Knesset committee.
Following the Ethics Committee’s decision, the foreign minister said he is standing his ground and calling for all Yisrael Beytenu ministers to avoid the parliamentary inquiry, which has become “Tibi’s private committee, whose main job is to give him a bigger office and a spokesman.”
Liberman said Tibi’s committee does not help Israeli Arabs, and does everything to prevent them from integrating into Israeli society.
“Tibi’s goal is to harm the relations between Israeli Arabs and the rest of the population,” he stated, “therefore no one should cooperate with him.”


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