More calls for Broshi to step down after another claim of sexual abuse
Zionist Union MK Shelly Yacimovich published a detailed encounter with yet another woman on social media on Sunday, who says she was sexually abused by MK Eitan Broshi, leading to renewed calls for him to step down.
“Broshi, who was the battalion commander of soldier M., sexually harassed her on a regular basis and made her life miserable,” Yacimovich wrote. “He looked at her intimate parts every time she entered his office, creating a threatening atmosphere. Her comrades in the battalion knew. There was always someone near her in case she would not be able to push him away on her own. The threat and the harassment were daily. She was imprisoned in a horrifying hierarchical power play and in a very dark context, where complaint was not an option.”
Yacimovich explained, “M. is one of many women who recently approached me and told me about the serious harassment they suffered from Broshi.”
Zionist Union MK Michal Biran responded to Yacimovich’s chilling post by calling on Broshi to resign.
“If Broshi believes that he is innocent, he must fight for it outside the Knesset. We are committed first of all to the public, and especially to these women who again and again have to encounter the person who hurt them and to fathom how such a person can serve in the Knesset.”
Yacimovich’s allegations come less than two weeks after Zionist Union leader Avi Gabbay suspended Broshi from the party and urged him to quit the Knesset due to a letter from a woman detailing how he sexually assaulted her in an elevator 15 years ago.
Broshi’s lawyer Ilan Bombach denied the incident took place and complained an alleged incident from 15 years ago was even being reported. Additionally, he filed a libel lawsuit against Gabbay for calling Broshi a sex offender.
Several women came out recently to complain about sexual harassment committed by the minister after he was seen last month pushing fellow Zionist Union MK Ayelet Nahmias-Verbin, who stood in his way on a narrow path on Kibbutz Be’eri.
Gabbay responded to the allegations against his party colleague by saying that, “A safe and protected public sphere for women is a target that we will continue fighting for, and scare tactics [by Broshi] will have no impact on us.”
“This is not a gray area or a marginal issue,” Yacimovich said in her post on Sunday. “This is at the heart of the most just struggle in all of human history: the struggle for equality for half of humanity – women. A fundamental and central part of this struggle is the basic right not to be prey to sexual violence, and the right not to be humiliated and threatened with ugly sexual harassment and obscene suggestions. This is as true in general as it is for those in power positions.”
Gil Hoffman contributed to this report.