Israel: Prime Minister Netanyahu Announces Formation of New Coalition Government
PM Netanyahu: “I have managed to set up a government which will take care of all the citizens of Israel.”
After seven weeks of negotiations, Israel’s designated Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, announced the formation of the country’s next coalition government. “Incoming prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu called President Isaac Herzog late on Wednesday night to announce he has successfully formed a government, nearly 40 days after the Likud chairman received the mandate to form a government from Herzog, taking the deadline down the wire,” The Jerusalem Post reported Wednesday night.
The announcement came just minutes before the deadline to build a coalition government was set to expire. Prime Minister Netanyahu had until midnight to inform the country’s president that he had the required majority in the parliament to form the next government. The new government is expected to be sworn in next week.
Netanyahu’s Likud party won 32 seats in last month’s election and needed the support from other right-wing parties to cross the 61-seat mark to secure a majority in the 120-seat Knesset.
With Wednesday’s announcement, Netanyahu — Israel’s longest-serving prime minister — will return to office after eighteen months, a period in which a series of so-called “anti-Netanyahu” coalition governments were formed to keep him from power. This will be the 6th government under his leadership.
The Israeli TV channel i24News reported:
Israel’s prime minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday night secured the final votes needed to form a government, minutes before his deadline to do so, and called Israeli President Isaac Herzog to finalize his rise to power.
Netanyahu now has a week to swear in his government. The parliament plenum only meets on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays, the confidence vote could only happen the following Monday. This means the government must be sworn in a week later, Monday, January 2.
This also gives Netanyahu’s incoming government time to finish passing three controversial bills into law. The top of the list seems to be what is referred to as the “Ben-Gvir law,” named after far-right lawmaker Itamar Ben-Gvir, which would allow the lawmaker, who is expected to serve as national security minister, expanded authority over the country’s police. The bill is controversial, with several politicians and police leaders speaking out against it.
The Times of Israel transcribed the Hebrew conversation PM Netanyahu had with President Herzog:
In a video of his conversation with Herzog, Netanyahu tells the president, “I wanted to inform you that, thanks to the immense public support we won in the elections, I have managed to set up a government which will take care of all the citizens of Israel. And I of course intend to establish it as quickly as possible.”
https://twitter.com/netanyahu/status/1605687416169168896
Bibi’s Return Irks Biden White House
Displeased by forming a possible right-leaning coalition in Jerusalem under Netanyahu’s leadership, the Biden White House is reportedly taking a hostile stance towards the incoming Israeli government.
“President Joe Biden and his aides have a plan for how to deal with the far-right, anti-Palestinian tilt of the incoming Israeli government: make it all about Benjamin Netanyahu,” Politico reported Tuesday.
The U.S. news website further explained:
The Biden administration will hold the presumptive Israeli prime minister personally responsible for the actions of his more extreme cabinet members, especially if they lead to policies that endanger a future Palestinian state, two U.S. officials familiar with the issue told POLITICO.
To keep the relationship with Israel robust, Biden aides say they need to limit its far-right excesses, and they see Netanyahu as their best conduit to exert such influence.
Not just the Biden administration, the mainstream media outlets, like The New York Times and The Washington Post, are equally perplexed to see Netanyahu return to power.
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Comments
I bet Barack Obama and all his pathetic little Marxist minions are butthurt about this.
I was thinking the same thing. After all the US tax dollars Obama funneled to get him out of office.
It’s always enjoyable to see that sick f*ck get his nose rubbed in a pile of sh*t, like he deserves.
Kinda clears any question whether B O is the one pulling the strings.
Anything President Weather Vane is consistent about comes from somebody else. B O holds grudges, and didn’t like Bibi at all, sort of on principle to start then in earnest after the PMs speech to the joint session. Annoying to have to watch a head of state who’s actually for the state he heads. They didn’t even make him use the back door to to the Capitol.
Der Bidengaffer has a plan for dealing with the Israeli govt? Hold them accuntable? Cause we don’tt like their policies, their diplomacy, or the guy they elected? I thought interfering in the affairs of other nations was bad.
I suppose neither the FBI, nor others of the “intelligence community” are gonna investigate, nor
persecuteprosecute their own election interference vs. Bibi. Their interference this time, I mean. (Do I feel another Twitter Files dump coming on? A wag — that’s “wag”, not WaG — can hope.)No matter. They’ll likely be as efffective at this as at their other international declarations, persuasions and ultimatums.
At least they’ll be able to reintroduce the 2 minutes hate. This one, I mean. They’re good at that, part. (Sorry, “there are those, who” are good at getting people all wee-wee’d up for some 2 minutes hate.)
Obama, and therefore Biden (as well as all their controllers), would very much like to see Israel (“from the river to the sea”) under Palestinian control.
Just because Netanyahu says he has a government doesn’t make it a fact. He has until Monday to announce it, and he’ll be spending all that time trying to put together an alternative one with the left. His strategy lately seems to have been to appear to be forming as right-wing a coalition as he can, not because he wants that but in order to lure Benny Gantz into coming to the nation’s “rescue” by joining Netanyahu so he can dump the right. That way Gantz can paint himself as a hero, and Netanyahu will be free to run the same sort of wishy-washy soft-left policies he has done throughout his tenure. And it’ll please the legal establishment that has him on trial for corruption; the charges are all bogus, but with the Israeli judiciary the way it is he’s in serious danger of being convicted anyway, so he wants to please them.
What we can hope for is that the left’s hatred for Netanyahu is now so strong that Gantz won’t be able to join him no matter how much he wants to, because if he does his whole party will abandon him and he’ll have nothing to offer. That way Netanyahu will be forced, kicking and screaming, to stick with the right-wing agreements he’s come to, and we might actually have a sane government for once.
Millhouse, I’ve been reading Arutz Sheva, Jpost, Ynet and Times of Israel. Initially, there was speculation in at least one of them that Netanyahu would do what you said he is doing. After that first report, I haven’t seen any reporting that he would turn to those Leftists to form a government. Also, bills have been passed, or are in the process of being passed, that satisfy the proposed members of the coalition. I don’t know on what you have based your hypothesis. Finally, let me point that if Netanyahu ever did what you are saying he might do, I think he would be finished as a politician.
Separately, chag sameach.
My hypothesis is based on consideration of his career and his character, and the sort of chicanery he has already engaged in in the past. We know what he is willing to do in order to be PM; all we have to do is look at the unity government he made with Gantz last time, and the fact that he offered to bring Ra’am into his coalition; they turned him down, not the other way around. His subsequent attacks on Bennett for having sold out to Ra’am were correct, but they were also cynical and hypocritical, since he would have done the same thing if he could.
You really twist yourself into pretzels to go anti Netanyahu
The fact is that Netanyahu is a squish. He’s Israel’s equivalent of Lindsay Graham. You can’t possibly look at his career and call him anything but that. These right-wingers he’s now binding himself to make him uncomfortable. They remind him of his parents and parents-in-law, and how much he has deviated from their principles in his pursuit of personal advancement.
What are these “extreme” demands of the “extreme” right? Take this so-called “Ben-Gvir bill”: all it says is that the police force’s policy is set by the police minister. In any other country in the world, that would be taken for granted, and it would be shocking not to have that be the case, but in Israel the ultimate say on police policy rests with the unelected Chief of Police, not with the responsible minister who is a member of the elected government.
The whole point of Ben-Gvir wanting to be police minister is to change policies that he disagrees with, but without this bill he won’t be able to, so there was no point in his getting elected in the first place. So he insists that before the government is sworn in, this bill must be passed so that his ministry will mean something. And the left — including at least 1/4 of the Likud — is up in arms at how terrible this is. So are the US and the EU, even though that’s how it has always worked in their countries.
Then the right-wing parties want a law passed giving the Knesset the right, when the supreme court strikes a law down, to pass it again and override the supreme court. Remember that Israel has no written constitution, but the supreme court strikes laws down if it thinks they conflict with its own notions and values. This is the unelected and self-appointing supreme court. And not just laws — it also claims the right to veto executive decisions. So basically the judicial branch has become a self-perpetuating leftist dictatorship. The right has got sick of that, and wants to end it. And the left screams that this is destroying “democracy” and the “rule of law”!
The Israelis will do whatever,however, and whenever to fight Iranian terror. and know that their existence is not dependent on the blessings of any President, especially Democrats who except for Truman ,have never backed up their talk of support for Israel and votes of support for supplying Israel with military aid when the chips are on the line The notion that bilateral recognition of Israel and Saudi Arabis requires the help of Biden is risible
Biden has to stop living in the past. The Palestinians have not been interested in a “future Palestinian state” for decades.
I highly reccomend Bibi’s autiobography which is fascinating and compelling reading about his family , and his role as the PM of Israel, especially with respect to his relationships with American presidents
“I have managed to set up a government which will take care of all the citizens of Israel.”
Wait a minute. A government taking care of its citizens [!!??!!] What a concept. To bad that such an idea never came up here.
Subotai Bahadur
“ especially if they lead to policies that endanger a future Palestinian state”
Jordan is the Palestinian state. It was created from over 75% of the Palestine Mandate for the Arabs, if my memory is correct. Judea and Samaria never were part of Jordan. Arabs in those regions not wishing to be part of Israel belong in Jordan.
Bibi is looking old or is that pic just odd? Good luck to him, he can not do any worse than the other side did these last 18 months.
I noticed that he looks almost gaunt. That could be the result of a change in diet or exercise habits. But with anyone his age it makes you wonder, and hope that all is ok with his health.
FJB. We know that his policies with respect to Israel have nothing to do with Bibi.
“I wanted to inform you that, thanks to the immense public support we won in the elections…”
I’m glad he’s back, but statements like this show him to be another politician. It’s funny how they can keep a straight face while they make such clearly ridiculous statements.