MKs Clinging To Power: Our Disastrous Policies Still Preferable To Elections That Would Trounce Us

“Anything has to be better than Netanyahu. Unless he offers me to share the premiership, which obviously is what the country needs, provided I get to go first.”

Jerusalem, May 18 – Ministers and officials in the embattled government and coalition of Prime Minister Naftali Bennett warned against attempts to topple them from power, citing the ultimate evil of opening a path for former Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to return to the premiership and using that as a political and rhetorical cudgel to facilitate their continued pursuit of decisions that undermine the fundamental values on which the Jewish State bases itself.

Minister of Foreign Affairs and Alternate Prime Minister Yair Lapid of Yesh Atid admonished fellow lawmakers today not to buckle under public pressure to bolt the government as others have done, bringing the slim-majority coalition close to the loss of its legal mandate. “I’m supposed to become Prime Minister next year, so you all better not mess this up for me,” he cautioned. “I better get my turn. I deserve it. Remember, it’s all about protecting Israeli democracy.”

“In the meantime,” he continued, “we must allow our coalition partner Ra’am to dictate the terms of the coalition’s continued existence, even at the expense of law and order, the Jewish character of the state, and the very legitimacy of the Zionist enterprise. But at least Bibi’s still not in the Prime Minister’ Office. That would be the worst. We can live with Bedouin takeover of the Negev and running it like a mafia; agricultural terrorism throughout the north; pandering to militant elements in mixed cities; ceding control of the holiest site in Judaism to Hamas; allowing tax money to flow to the coffers of the Palestinian Authority, which rewards terrorists and pays their families pensions; and treating Jews who defend themselves from Arab attack as criminals. Anything has to be better than Netanyahu. Unless he offers me to share the premiership, which obviously is what the country needs, provided I get to go first this time.”

The coalition holds only sixty seats in the 120-seat Knesset, meaning it cannot guarantee a majority for any piece of legislation. At the moment the only factor keeping the Bennett government in power is the Opposition’s lack of unity around any candidate to replace him. Netanyahu enjoys the highest support as just such a figure, but cannot himself muster the sixty-one votes necessary to bring down Bennett.

For his part, Opposition head Netanyahu lambasted the Bennett-Lapid government for partnering with the Islamist Ra’am Party, asserting that under the circumstances no such government represents the interests of the Jewish State unless he gets to lead it.

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