Israeli lawmaker Simcha Rothman, a key architect of the government’s controversial judicial overhaul, defended his actions after he was filmed seizing a protester’s megaphone in New York City. Rothman claimed that the small group of demonstrators attacked him and his wife before he grabbed the megaphone, but there was no video evidence of this. The incident sparked outrage in Israel and the US, with protesters demanding that Rothman be disinvited from a major parade in support of Israel. The protesters are part of a network of Israeli activists in the US and other countries called UnXeptable, who have been holding weekly rallies in Manhattan’s Washington Square Park against the judicial overhaul.
Simcha Rothman, a member of Israel's governing coalition and chairman of the Knesset Law, Justice and Constitution committee, was seen forcibly grabbing a megaphone from a protester while walking the streets of New York City on Friday evening. The incident led to a criminal complaint being filed against him, which was ultimately closed by the NYPD on Saturday. Protesters from UnXeptable, a grassroots network of Israeli expats, said that Rothman snatched the megaphone from a Columbia graduate student and that she intended to file a police report against Rothman with New York City police.
Religious Zionism MK Simcha Rothman was evacuated by police from an event at Tel Aviv University after protesters disrupted the panel discussion on the proposed judicial overhaul. Rothman's comments were persistently interrupted by demonstrators chanting "Democracy" and calling him a fascist. After he was unable to fully participate in the panel, Rothman was escorted out of the building by security guards and placed in a campus security vehicle which brought him to his car. The protest was attributed to a left-right rivalry that went back to the establishment of the state.
