Dichter Marks End of Knesset Service, Says He Will Continue as Minister

Agriculture and Food Security Minister Avi Dichter said on Friday that he had finished his Knesset service this week, closing a parliamentary chapter that began in 2006. In a personal statement, he said he would continue serving as a minister. Dichter dated his first swearing-in as a member of Knesset to April 17, 2006. Looking back over 20 years, he said he had served on the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, chaired it for three years and established the sovereign wealth fund committee. He said he had spent roughly half that period as a government minister. Before entering parliament, he described 34 years in state security, including service in Sayeret Matkal and the Shin Bet, which he headed during the Second Intifada. He singled out two laws passed in 2018 as achievements in which he took particular pride: Basic Law: Israel as the Nation State of the Jewish People, and the law deducting Palestinian Authority payments to terrorists from funds transferred to the PA. Dichter said he had worked on the nation-state law for eight years and advanced the deductions law with MK Stern from the opposition. He linked his attachment to the nation-state law to growing up as the son of Holocaust survivors. “I will continue to serve you as a minister,” Dichter wrote. Addressing incoming legislators, he urged them to listen to individuals and remember their responsibilities as public representatives.