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Avigdor Liberman shuts the door on Benjamin Netanyahu. He and Yisrael Beytenu will recommend to the President the name of former Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot to form the next government.
Channel 12 political reporter Daphna Liel quoted him in Hebrew. “The world will turn upside down before I sit with Netanyahu, even if he offers me to be first in a rotation,” Liberman said. On a minority government he was just as flat. “We made it clear, and I wrote it several times. It will not happen.” Liberman said that his party will recommend former IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot for the mandate to form a government, “even though he ran the most egotistical campaign there is,” and added that he would recommend Yair Lapid to be the speaker of the Knesset. i24NEWS reported he also blamed that campaign for costing the opposition seven or eight seats.
The elections to Israel’s Parliament, the Knesset, took place on October 27. A government must include 61 Members of Knesset out of 120. The president decides who receives the mandate after consultations. Netanyahu’s list obtained 53 seats, while the parties that ran against him got 48 seats, including Liberman’s 7. The Arab parties won 19 seats: 11 seats were won by the Joint List and 8 seats by the Ra’am party. N12 reported that Naftali Bennett’s B’Yachad list will recommend Eisenkot, and that Yair Golan’s Democrats list is expected to. In addition to Liberman’s 7 seats, this brings the total to 48 seats. The Jerusalem Post reported on Sunday that the Joint List and Ra’am are expected to recommend Eisenkot as well. Therefore, if they do, the total number of seats recommended by the various factions would be 67.
This does not equal a coalition. Liberman previously stated that he wouldn’t sit with Netanyahu and that he wouldn’t negotiate a minority government. Liberman, Eisenkot and Bennett all had previously ruled out negotiating with the Arab parties as partners in a government. Forty-eight seats is not 61.
According to N12 calculations, Netanyahu can rely on the following 46 certain recommenders if UTJ does not recommend him: Likud 27, Otzma Yehudit 7, Religious Zionism 6 and Shas 6. i24NEWS reported on Monday that Shas will recommend Netanyahu to the President. But even if UTJ decides to recommend him at the last minute, Netanyahu will still be short of 8 seats, at 53 if UTJ joins. He will therefore continue to serve as caretaker Prime Minister until a new government is sworn in.
According to The Jerusalem Post, Israel President Isaac Herzog will receive the final election results from Central Elections Committee Chairman Noam Sohlberg this Wednesday and then proceed to hold consultations with the various parties, starting with the smallest of them all. Yisrael Beytenu is scheduled Wednesday at 7:30 p.m., after Religious Zionism and Shas. Herzog will have to name a candidate for the post of prime minister by November 11. That candidate will have 28 days to form a coalition, which can be extended by an additional 14 days. The newly elected Knesset will be sworn in on November 10. The Jerusalem Post reported that the opposition plans to replace Knesset Speaker Amir Ohana, and Avigdor Liberman said he will back Yair Lapid for the speaker’s post.
Channel 12 political analyst Amit Segal today added that this means a unity government or elections. (He was not quoting Liberman).
