About one month after the current coalition was formed, Yahadut Hatorah MKs Moshe Gafni, Meir Porush, Yisrael Eichler and Yaakov Asher submitted a private bill to dissolve the coalition. The bill did not receive attention and it has not advanced. Members of the Meretz and Labor opposition parties also submitted similar bills.
The latter two, Meretz and Labor, decided on Monday 9 Kislev to submit the bills now, and they will be voted on in Knesset on Wednesday, 11 Kislev.
Perhaps a bit of clarification regarding the process.
When a private bill is submitted, it must sit for forty days before it can be prepared for a preliminary vote. A government bill on the other hand does not have the forty day waiting period and it does not require a preliminary vote, but heads directly for a first vote.
Now that the opposition MKs realize their original bills have not moved but they have indeed passed the 40-day waiting period, it remains to be seen if any of them will push the bills along to dissolve the coalition amid an atmosphere that elections are nearing.
According to opposition chairman Labor MK Eitan Cabel, while he and his colleagues are aware the chances of moving the bill forward remain slim at present, the timing is important and not the newspaper headlines. As such, Labor and Meretz decided to move ahead calling to dissolve the current Knesset.
(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
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One Response
This involves a bit of risk. The likely result is that the next kenesset will be the same as this one, with the nationalists (Likud/Bayit Yehudi/Yisrael Beiteinu) having a solid plurality, and the options of forming a coalition with either the hareidim (who demand an end to conscription of yeshiva students) or the center-right parties consisting primarily of ex-Likudniks (such as Livni and now Moshe Kahlon as well as Yesh Atid). However anything that makes it more likely the nationalists can form a government with hareidim (e.g. Kahlon gets a good turnout) makes it more likely the right-wing can move ahead with penal sanctions for yeshivos that aren’t sufficiently zionist about sending their students to the army.