The Bennett-Lapid government plans to advance two dramatic laws: the cooling-off law for Benjamin Netanyahu and the law that would allow the dissolution of the Likud and the recruitment of defectors.
According to the coalition agreement revealed by Amit Segal on Channel 12, a law will be promoted that will subject to a four-year forced cooling-off period anyone who has served as prime minister for an eight-year period - which is Netanyahu alone.
This means that if the law passes, he will not be allowed to run for the Knesset in the next elections. This creates an interest for Netanyahu in preserving his Knesset term, since if it falls prematurely, someone else in the Likud will be a candidate for prime minister.
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The second law allows for splitting the Likud faction under much more favorable conditions than those that exist today: According to the bill, this could be done by only four MKs instead of ten - Likud defectors who would be recruited in the event that Ra'am decides to resign.
Likud response: ""Bennett is turning Israel into a dark dictatorship - North Korea and Iran. Prime Minister Netanyahu is fighting Iran, and Bennett is bringing a law from Iran. This law will remove Israel from the company of enlightened democracies and put it among the darkest tyrannical regimes.".
""After Bennett deceived his voters and transferred votes from the right to the left just to appoint himself prime minister with 6 seats, now he is introducing a law that does not exist in any democracy in the world, with the aim of disqualifying Prime Minister Netanyahu from running for the Knesset and thus eliminating the strong leader of the right. Bennett is crossing every red line in his mad pursuit of the prime minister's seat at all costs.".
Right response: ""There is no, there was no, and there will be no agreement on preventing a candidate from running for the Knesset. This is a proposal that was raised, not agreed upon, and it will not be agreed upon. The only thing that was and is agreed upon is limiting the Prime Minister's term to 8 years or 2 terms.".
The party added: "The coalition agreements have not yet been signed and are currently undergoing changes and revisions. Some of the things that were brought up are inaccurate, and some are relevant to previous drafts. The agreements will be published with full transparency to the public as soon as their contents are agreed upon.".
Amit Segal noted after the denial that a source in the intended coalition admitted that Yamina agreed to a clause that would prohibit Netanyahu from running for the Knesset, but panicked after the announcement.
