the first openly gay member of the Knesset. Five more openly gay Israelis—Nitzan Horowitz, Itzik Smuli, Yorai Lahav-Hertzano, Idan Roll and Amir Ohana—have been elected to the Knesset since then. In 2019, after the April general elections, a record-breaking five openly gay MKs were elected. They are Itzik Smuli (Labor), Amir Ohana (Likud), Eitan Ginzburg, Idan Roll and Yorai Lahav-Hertzano (each being a member of Blue and White). In 2018, the city of Ra'anana elected Eitan Ginzburg (he later became an MK) as mayor, making him the first openly gay mayor in Israel. In 2019, ahead of the September legislative election, Nitzan Horowitz successfully challenged incumbent Tamar Zandberg for the leadership of Meretz, which made Meretz the first Israeli party to elect an openly gay person as its leader. In July 2019, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appointed Evan Cohen, a linguist and LGBT rights activist, as the foreign media spokesperson. Nevertheless, there still have been anti-gay politicians. In 1997, President Ezer Weizman compared homosexuality to alcoholism in front of high school students. This provoked major controversy, and the President received numerous calls from civil rights activists and liberal Knesset members. Shortly following, 300 people demonstrated outside of Weizman's residence, demanding his resignation. He later apologised for these statements. On 20 February 2008, Shlomo Benizri, a Knesset member from the religious Shas party, a member of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's ruling coalition, blamed earthquakes that had recently struck the Middle East on the activities of homosexuals. Benizri said in a Knesset plenary session, "Why do earthquakes happen? ... One of the reasons is the things to which the Knesset gives legitimacy, to sodomy." He recommended that instead of merely reinforcing buildings to withstand earthquakes, the Government should pass legislation to outlaw "perversions like adoptions by gay couples". Benizri stated that, "A cost-effective way of averting earthquake damage would be to stop passing legislation on how to encourage homosexual activity in the State of Israel, which anyways causes earthquakes." In 2015, Bezalel Smotrich, a Knesset member from the Orthodox-religious Jewish Home party, referred to LGBT people as "abnormal", stating: "At home, everyone can be abnormal, and people can form whatever family unit they want. But they can't make demands from me, as the state." In the same discussion, he told the audience, "I am a proud homophobe". He later apologized, and retracted his statement, saying: "Someone shouted from the crowd, and I