T. Belman. I support Saar for the same reasons Saar is challenging him. Bibi never delivered on his promises regarding settlement construction, E-1 and destruction of illegal homes. Nor was he aggressive enough with Hamas. There are other policy positions that I disagree with.
Also Bibi had two tries to come up with a coalition and didn’t succeed. He should have made demands on UTJ and Shas to compromise. I have heard nothing to suggest he will succeed next time.
I see Bibi as the problem, not the solution. I believe that many people avoid the right because of his image and his indictments. Saar will attract more people from the center to back him because he is not Bibi. Meanwhile Bennett is doing a great job as Def Min.
David Bitan announces he has enough signatures to force secret vote in Likud Central Committee, hours after PM agrees to go up against challenger Gideon Sa’ar
By RAOUL WOOTLIFF, TOI Today, 1:08 am 1
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Likud MK David Bitan at a Likud faction meeting at the Knesset on November 20, 2017. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
Likud strongman David Bitan announced just after midnight Wednesday that he has enough signatures to call a secret vote on cancelling the party leadership vote, a major setback for MK Gideon Sa’ar who was planning to mount the first serious challenge to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s 14-year hold on the party.
Bitan’s announcement came just minutes after the Knesset dissolved itself, meaning third elections in less than a year are a certainty, and just hours after the Netanyahu and Likud Central Committee Chairman MK Haim Katz had agreed on December 26 as the date for leadership primaries.
“I have reached the number of signatures needed in order to convene the (Likud) Central Committee to hold a secret vote on cancelling the primaries,” Bitan, a Netanyahu loyalist, tweeted.
Hours earlier, Bitan had told Channel 12 TV that the next round of elections would be “Netanyahu’s last chance” to form a coalition. Asked what would happen if the Netanyahu-led right-wing and ultra-Orthodox bloc again failed to win a majority 61 Knesset seats, Bitan said he didn’t “want to get into that” but believed the PM would be successful on the third attempt.
The move appears to be an attempt to outmaneuver Sa’ar, who has pushed for the leadership primary, and prevent a wider vote among Likud members.
Sa’ar had argued that Netanyahu was divisive and proved he could not put together a coalition.
“I will conduct a positive, clean, and issue-driven campaign, and present an agenda for Israel’s future,” Sa’ar said in a statement earlier Wednesday.
“There is a national need for a breakthrough that will end the ongoing political crisis, enable the formation of a strong government, and unite the people of Israel,” he added.
Sa’ar had initially called for the primary to take place during the 21-day period ending Wednesday for MKs to recommend a candidate to form a coalition, saying that it was the only way to break the deadlock between the Likud party and its main rival Blue and White.
With no candidate receiving the support of 61 MKs by midnight Wednesday, national elections were automatically called. Due to various timing conflicts, the Knesset is voting throughout the day on a bill to set the date of the elections earlier, on March 2.
While Netanyahu initially opposed a leadership primary, he agreed this week to hold one after the end of the 21-day period.
“The prime minister won’t oppose primaries. If there are general elections there will be a primary for the Likud leadership and Prime Minister Netanyahu will have a big victory,” the Likud said in a statement Monday night.
That announcement came a day after Sa’ar was loudly jeered as he called for a primary at a meeting of the Likud Central Committee, which voted to scrap a planned general primary for the party list. Netanyahu too was heckled at the event, by some pro-Sa’ar activists.
Netanyahu is widely expected to beat Sa’ar in a primary, with sky-high support inside Likud despite charges in a trio of corruption cases against him. The party, which has only had four chiefs since the country’s founding, is seen as fiercely loyal, though Sa’ar, trying to convince voters that new blood is needed, has hammered at Netanyahu’s inability to form a coalition.
Sa’ar’s bid has, however, drawn broad support from a number of influential Likud mayors, including from the party’s rightist pro-settlement wing, while many of the party’s top officials, including Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein, Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan, MK Avi Dichter, and Regional Cooperation Minister Tzachi Hanegbi, have remained pointedly mum about who they would support in the event of a leadership contest.
Interviewed by The Times of Israel on Monday, Sa’ar said that internal polls show him “not far behind” Netanyahu, “and that is even before the race has properly started.”
@ Edgar G.:
Thank you. I’m glad you restrained yourself.
@ Sebastien Zorn:
And you figured all this out after the fact, as you say….Wonderful…..!!…
I think I’ll come to you when I have problems that require real prognostication.
Bear seems to be “labeling” me, (even sometimes libeling me) as if being loyal to my convictions-whatever they may be- was something so unusual that it requires special notice.
I think that the “Israeli rot” has set in with his thinking. Pragmatic to the core, although he’s not running for anything..Perhaps he’s studying to be a political guru…In that case……
I’d better stop, this subject is a wonderful vista I see, of possibilities and speculative meanderings…….
I’m far too polite to suggest that you actually sound like a duck trying to lay an ostrich egg… That last part of your post I mean… (I remember that show It always seemed to end in “A NEW CAR”…..!!)
@ Edgar G.:I saw your comments about the Israeli public and decided I need not remark on your views. You have your views and feelings and I am not intending to try and change them.
Bibi will not however have power internationally any longer because he can not form a government. Is that going to change in a third election??? I highly doubt it!
@ Bear Klein:
My reference to “at the height of his powers” was pointed at his international skills. If you read my post until the end, which I often feel you do not, judging my your answers, you would have seen that I included the disloyalty and stupidity of the Israeii public……
Thanks for the tip/reminder on the W in G. I was on their list for years, but some years ago, it stopped. And I didn’t notice it at the time. In fact Nadia and I had several email exchanges over the years . They are most admirable people.
@ Edgar G.:I agree with you, Edgar. However, as an ex-Marxist, tired of scientific predictions that never predict anything, accurately – not that I’m saying you made one – unable to kick the habit of being a know-it-all, completely, I have decided to predict that which has already occurred, in good Marxist fashion and calling it science. I predict [drumroll, and may I have the envelope, please, Vanna];
There will be a third election in [ straining with eyes hands covering closed eyes, opens them.] March!
@ Edgar G.:
Bibi is at the height of his political powers. Not all he twice could not form a coalition and he is in serious legal trouble.
I guess we will just have to disagree. You may not be a “Loyalist” to Bibi but you clearly are very loyal. He has done many excellent things for Israel and has great political and diplomatic skill. However, his approach to getting rid of any likely successors to him has not been good for Israel. Also the charges in case 4000 which are very serious stem from him trying to make sure he stays in power.
By the way the Women in Green are still quite active. You should get on their email list and take a look at their website if interested.
@ Bear Klein:
Much of what you say makes sense…But…I am NOT a “Bibi Loyalist” I’m not an anybody loyalist, and never was, except for Begin. I’m an ISRAEL loyalist. I reject totally the tenet that you promote, that Netanyahu should retire. He is presently at the very height of his powers, and the rush of positive political approaches to Israel have come about by his well planned foresight, and to expect him to slink away in the shadows is nothing but RIDICULOUS. Israel needs him now …more than ever.
That the voters have been blinded by Mandelblits criminal proceedings is very unfortunate, and says more about the lack of intelligence of the average Israel voter than anything positive about them.
It’s a very difficult situation, PURELY because those that have risen suddenly, like Blue and White, are headed by Netanyahu long-time haters, larded by, I believe foreign money, and strong ambitions to replace him They, by their actions care nothing about Israel, only about themselves. Nobody could have more reason for animus against Netanyahu than Bennett, but he has quelled it, for the good of the country, and is loyally backing him. He knows that by backing him, he’s backing Israel
You know Bear,,, people make me sick. I’ve always regarded loyalty as a prime quality in a person. Israelis…don’t have it, and they don’t deserve Netanyahu. I used to write that the best thing would be, to sweep the whole country clean of people, and only allow back, those who REALLY wanted to live there and support Eretz Yisrael. I’d forgotten this for a while but that is the truth. I used to write about it, being so disgusted time after time about the behaviour of Israeli people, of whom I got a VERY first hand view, when living there. The country…..Wonderfiul…The people….Yeechh…
Of course I’m generalising. Those who WANT to live in and support Israel I strongly admire,they are wonderful folks, and they are being “pulled down” by the 30% or so, of riff-raff which comes from ALL social levels, and as we know, also from the political, legal, and ensconced govt. circles.. (It cannot but result in decent people being influenced by these highly placed mamzerim).
Which puts me in mind of The Women in Green..whom we haven’t heard about for quite a while.
@ Edgar G.:Saar may or may not be successful. Likely odds that if it continues to be just Bibi and him in a Likud Primary, Bibi will probably win.
Then we are at square one status quo. Bibi has not been able to form a coalition twice running in the last 9 months.
I think for political reasons he should drop out of the race and let Barkat, Saar and Edelstein run against each other for the head of the Likud. If anyone of them was at the top of the Likud ticket a coalition would be formed. Bibi has so many enemies that he is unable to form a coalition. Israel needs a government.
Bibi hopefully will take or get a pardon and retire. His hanging on is not doing the Israeli political scene any good. I understand you are a true Bibi loyalist to the end. I have more than one friend like this. A friend of mine on the Likud Central Committee who is a crazy Bibi loyalist has disowned me so to speak. He called anyone runs against Bibi a PLO supporter and a leftist.
I think Bitan is wrong..that the primary vote should proceed. Netanyahu would win by a large margin,and it would strengthen his position with those LIKUDNIKS who are secretly weakening. It would show the Party’s confidence that he is innocent of all the trumped up charges as well.
Sorry BEAR, I thought it was you’re highlight quote, when now, as I read above, it came from TED. …Again apologies. I was “too quick on the draw”…
@ Bear Klein:
Your Highlight, actually highlights Sa’ar’s problem just as much. He was NOT able to get 61 MKs to vote for him even though he has been preparing for months… And all the polls for weeks past about Sa’ar, whow that his leadership will reduce the LIKUD by 6-8 sets, falsely indicating that it is becoming irrelevant to the voter, ….whilst, at the SAME time the other Right Coalition partners are getting extra seats…obviously from LIKUD. Your declaration that he would get “many more votes from the people” is pure, shaky speculation, with no evidence of same.
If you want to blame someone, and you do, why not concentrate your considerable skills towards blaming Mandelblit and the Prosecutor’s Office, corrupt to the core, with the asst. pros. going off on a safari in the middle of the indictment, and Nitzan just happening to retire from his position,….after he’s delivered the goods to the “higher-ups”…
And TED why enumerate the things that Netanyahu did NOT do, instead of showing the far more important things he DID do. However well placed you may be, you just CANNOT know the inner workings of Netanyahu’s mind, nor the deliberations of the inner cabinet. These items you mention are VERY obvious, and that they have not been done, MUST have some significance, with which you are not informed…
This can show a personal bias against Netanyahu, whereas I always have felt that you carefully stayed politically impartial-publicly., whilst encouraging the diverse opinions from the posters
@ David melech:
Even worse…It could “LOSE the case”.. And that’s English English….!!
TED, put this very well and I concur with him!
T. Belman said,
Ted as a lawyer you should know a simple error can loose the case.
‘Also bibi had too many tries to come up with a coalition. ‘ or ‘Also bibi had two tries to come up with a coalition. ‘
As a Canadian your use is english english not yankie english.