Bayit Yehudi leader Minister Naftali Bennett is not making an effort to hide his anger as he blames Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu for the party’s dismal election results. While Bayit Yehudi has 12 seats in the outgoing 19th Knesset, it will only have 8 seats in the 20th Knesset.
This all but guarantees Bennett’s grandiose plans of being the ‘major coalition partner’ will not be actualized in the next government.
MK Ayelet Shaked may have to abandon her plans to become the next Minister of Public Security. However, Bennett is still likely to receive one of the top three cabinet posts; foreign minister, finance minister or defense minister. Moshe Kahlon of the Kulanu announced early in the campaign that he will not enter any coalition without receiving the Finance Ministry portfolio, so this would leave Bennett with the Foreign Ministry or Defense Ministry. One may opine that Netanyahu would prefer to permit Moshe Ya’alon to continue as defense minister, which may result in Naftali Bennett becoming Israel’s next foreign minister.
Bennett blames Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s messages of panic on Election Day, which led to many dati leumi voters abandoning Bayit Yehudi to vote for Likud, fearing if they do not, Labor would be tapped to form the coalition government.
This is undoubtedly true regarding Eli Yishai’s Yachad party as well. While all pre-election polls in the past 2 or more weeks stated Yishai would receive four or five seats, the prime minister’s Election Day tactics created a new reality, one that leaves Eli Yishai, Yoni Chetboun and Baruch Marzel out of the 20th Knesset. Pollsters on Wednesday morning 27 Adar report Yachad fell short of entering Knesset by 11,000 votes. Some analysts feel Baruch Marzel and his Kahane supporters fell short of bringing the voters as promised.
(The number of seats may fluctuate. The Central Election Committee states the final numbers will be released Thursday morning, 28 Adar).
(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
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10 Responses
1. By gaining votes at the expense of other right-wing parties (whose voters were afraid that if Likud did poorly, the other right-wing parties would support a Labor-led government), Likud didn’t make it easier to form a government (which is what matters in a parliamentary system), and perhaps made it harder.
2. It is possible that Yachad was “too hareidi” for its ultra-nationalist electorate, and “too nationalistic” for its hareidi supporters.
3. Netanyahu is no better off at forming a government than he was before. His projected coalition of nationalists and hareidim would require the nationalists to give up on their dream of ending the de facto exemption of hareidim from military service, and it is unclear if enough nationalists will agree. Ne may be forced to include Yesh Atid rather than the Hareidim,or to allow Labor to join as a junior partner. Yisrael Beiteinu might be very unlikely to agree to end criminal sanctions for hareidim refusing to serve in the army, but they might be bribable.
I think Shas will get the Ministry of the Interior and Ministry of Education. UTJ will get Ministry of Health (because Litzman is great at that job) and maybe Litzman will get to be head of the Finance Committee, because he’s honest and great at balancing the books.
If the Chareidim really believe that Learning protects the whole country from the millions of enemies, then why they waste so much Learning-Time, with all these rallies; They should have Learned non-stop, to protect that Seventh seat.
The joint list of Eli Yishai’s Yachad – Ha’am Itanu together with Otzma Yehudit was a mere 11,000 or so votes short of making it into the Knesset according to the near final tally.
A full 130,000 votes were needed to pass the 3.25% threshold percentage raised by the outgoing Knesset; previously the threshold percentage was 2% of the voting populace.
Likud, Yesh Atid and Jewish Home made raising the threshold a priority when they formed a coalition government in March 2013, at the time agreeing to raise the threshold to 4%.
‘It is possible that Yachad was “too hareidi” for its ultra-nationalist electorate, and “too nationalistic” for its hareidi supporters’
There maybe a little something (,but only a little ,)to that
The general tzibbur was tired of Netanyahu-they just didn’t want him to lose
שטייגען רצח כי הם חיינו
44%
נוסע לים לחוף הנפרד
21%
מטה מרנן ורבנן
26%
אחראי קלפי בחצור
10%
The poll query was
איך אתה מתכוון לבלות את יום הבחירות?
To #3 According to this straw poll many surely did.
There is, however, also an obligatory adjournment of
ביטולה הם קיומה
From the current results that they are saying, bibi has no government if Lieberman doesn’t sit with the chareidim and cancel the draft. Labor very possibly won, unless he takes Lapid and Lieberman instead of the chareidim, which would leave us a lot worse off than we were before. If yishai would have made it in bibi would be in a steadier position. He messed himself up, and we may suffer tremendously from that.
Rainus: Deri as Minister of the Interior? That’s what led to his going to jail. Hmmm?
About Time: Actually, everyone wanted Yishai to win, especially to beast Shas. People were just afraid that if Herzog got more seats, he would be given first crack, even though it was really the total seats of the Right that mattered.
Hopefully, the IDF vote, which was not counted yet, will help Yachad.
I vote to ban Yira from commenting.