Israel’s High Court of Justice ruled on Monday that Knesset speaker Yuli Edelstein must schedule a parliamentary vote on his replacement by Wednesday.
The Likud Party, to which Edelstein belongs, had previously said that a move by Blue and White to replace the longtime speaker would be the nail in the coffin of ongoing unity government talks with the Blue and White Party.
The decision comes a day after the court ruled that the Knesset had to be reopened, after Edelstein controversially shuttered it due to the coronavirus pandemic. Several Knesset members have already been put under quarantine due to fear of possible coronavirus exposure.
According to Chief Justice Esther Hayut, the legislature could not be closed due to health concerns, but should rather find solutions which would enable legislative business to continue with restricted physical contact.
In addition, seven MKs who are currently in quarantine—Interior Minister Aryeh Deri, Regional Affairs Minister Tzachi Hanegbi, Transportation Minister Bezalel Smotrich, Shas MKs Moshe Abutbul and Yitzhak Cohen, and Blue and White MKs Ram Ben-Barak and Alon Shuster—will also be allowed to vote, in a manner yet to be finalized.
With committees expected to be formed, most will be split between two rooms, with members of the panels communicating with each other via videoconference.
Senior Blue and White MK Moshe Ya’alon, himself a former Likud member, told JNS that “Netanyahu lost the election. But instead of accepting the results, he is irresponsibly using the coronavirus crisis to close the courts and stop the Knesset from functioning, leaving him and his interim government free to do whatever they wish.”
The former defense minister and Israel Defense Forces chief of staff added that “we in Blue and White will establish a wide government led by Benny Gantz, even if at first it will be a narrow one. We must do so in order to save the state. We will not allow Israel to become a dictatorship.”
In absence of an agreement with the Likud, Blue and White’s only potential path to a government is to form a minority coalition of 46 MKs, backed by outside support from the Joint List of majority-Arab parties. Prior to the elections, Blue and White members including Gantz and Ya’alon insisted that they would not form a government with the support of the anti-Zionist Joint List.
Meanwhile, several members of Blue and White, including members of Ya’alon’s faction, have vowed not to support any government based on support from the Joint List.
Blue and White has also vowed not to sit together in any government led by Netanyahu. Yet, Gantz has now expressed his willingness to consider a unity government based on a rotation arrangement.
In an interview with Israel’s Channel 12 news over the weekend, Gantz said that “at the moment, all options need to be on the table. It wouldn’t be responsible on my part not to consider every alternative.” He added that in the current situation, “It’s of the utmost importance not to ask about what I had said but [about] what needs to be done.”
The Blue and White chairman criticized Likud’s ultimatum that replacing the Knesset speaker would put an end unity negotiations, tweeting that “someone who wants unity doesn’t use ultimatums, doesn’t use contrived leaks and certainly doesn’t hurt democracy and the citizenry and paralyze the Israeli Knesset.”
Meanwhile, Gantz currently holds the official mandate from Israeli President Reuven Rivlin to form a government based on the 61 recommendations he received from MKs (including the Joint List) to form a government, compared to only 58 recommendations for Netanyahu.
If neither Gantz nor Netanyahu can form a government, and the parties fail to reach a unity arrangement, Israel will likely be thrust into a fourth round of elections.