Former Finance Minister begs Netanyahu not to choose Deri for Interior Minister, cites Shas chairman’s jail stint for corruption., I AGREE.
Why not consider consider negotiating with Lapid rather than Shas and UTJ?
By Benny Moshe, INN
Yesh Atid chairman and former Finance Minister Yair Lapid called on Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu not to appoint Shas chairman Aryeh Deri as a senior minister on Saturday, claiming Deri’s previous jail term for corruption charges makes him incapable of being placed in charge of a government portfolio.
“Mr. Prime Minister, you won the big election,” Lapid wrote on FacebookSaturday. “If that’s what the majority chose, this is what was meant to be now, and all of us – the Opposition and the coalition – must go back to working for the State of Israel.”
“Hang on, however,” he continued. “Are you happy with the idea that there will be appointed a senior minister (my understanding is the Interior Minister), an MKresponsible for billions of shekels, a person convicted of fraud? (referring to Deri – ed.).”
Lapid added that the judges who handled Deri’s corruption case noted that he led a “lifestyle of bribes” over a five-year period and that the chairman had not been sent to jail over an isolated incident. Deri served a two-year jail term for corruption after a 1999 conviction; after heading Shas throughout the nineties, he was replaced by MK Eli Yishai, now head of Yachad-Ha’am Itanu.
“Abandon such a person from maintaining the public purse, Prime Minister – this is all of our money,” Lapid concluded.
Deri responded on Saturday night, by referring to Lapid as “the biggest failure of a Finance Minister in Israel’s history,” and was incredulous that he “still dares to preach after he devastated thousands of families and brought them to starvation.”
Calling Lapid “amateurish,” he added that “the people of Israel need new experiences with different leadership.” Shas’s platform for the 20th Knesset elections was based upon providing solutions to Israel’s cost of living crisis.
I’m no fan of Lapid but I agree with him. Having someone convicted of fraud running a government ministry is a terrible idea and Netanyahu should try to form a coalition without Deri if possible..
I had not been made aware that the once and probably never again finance minister, Mr Lapid, shall have any say-so regarding who serves as part of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s next government. Of course, Mr Lapid and his particular brood shall have their votes against the new government when the Knesset shall vote to empower the new majority government. As for Mr Deri, he is correct in identifying Mr Lapid’s role as finance minister as one of the most disastrous in the history of modern Israel.
In any case, I assume that Mr Kahlon shall serve as finance minister, a position he had sought, and I think he shall serve the Jewish state well in that capacity. I also think the time shall come when Mr Kahlon and Mr Bennett shall form part of the top leadership of an expanded Jewish nationalist and Jewish religious coalition that will be in position to dominate Israeli Knesset politics for a very long time. And that is a future of which I heartily anticipate.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
Zu nevela v’zu treifa
Choice between self serving bunch of mostly corrupt religious charlatans or self serving leftist ideologues.
Shas will cause no coalition problems as long as they are paid enough to allow them to be compliant. Lapid has a mostly radical leftist contingent that make up the party little different than Meretz. They will cause and influence the policy of any government and they have more MK’s than shas giving them more power.
For stability and a more right and right of center government Shas is preferable.