[JPost] - According to a Channel 13 poll, most Israelis support the coalition deal signed on Monday between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Blue and White leader Benny Gantz. The numbers (62% in favor and 22% opposed) are not surprising.
Following three Knesset elections that ended in deadlock and numerous negotiations that led to nowhere, the public is both fed up and beaten down. The prospect of returning to the ballot box for a fourth time — particularly with the country in the throes of the coronavirus crisis — made the very inking of the Netanyahu-Gantz agreement for an "emergency national unity government" palatable. Under any other circumstances, the deal in question would be cause for dismay, if not outrage.
...Nevertheless, a majority still hopes for the next government, however bloated, to be up and running and ready to heal the ailing economy before it dies of COVID-19. Though a gargantuan task — especially for a coalition that contains an array of capitalists, socialists and fiscal fantasists — it is a mission that enjoys national consensus. Except, of course, among the "anybody but Bibi" extremists. You know, the ones who are unleashing the wrath they previously reserved exclusively for Netanyahu on Gantz.
YES, THE politicians who propped up the former IDF chief-of-staff as the perfect candidate to replace the longest-serving prime minister in Israel’s history are treating him like a traitor.
Take Yesh Atid chairman Yair Lapid, for instance.
Gantz’s co-pilot in the Blue and White "cockpit," Lapid — like the bulk of the bloc’s motley crew — was willing to join forces with the anti-Zionist Joint List, comprised of Arab partites, in the endeavor to oust Netanyahu. That’s how far Gantz’s gang was prepared to go in the absence of a Knesset majority to form a government, despite repeated declarations that they would never even consider accepting outside backing from a party that includes proponents of terrorism against Jews.
Luckily, Blue and White MKs Yoaz Hendel and Zvi Hauser, as well as Gesher MK Orly Levy-Abecassis, refused to cross that particular red line. If they had not, Gantz would have cobbled together a minority government, with the Joint List heading the opposition — and thus privy to all state and military secrets.
Kinda like electing the Obama POTUS.
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