Gafni: Evil Bennett, get out of our sight • Litzman: Take off your kippa

8 June 2021   

The leaders of the Shas and United Torah Judaism parties - Aryeh Deri, Moshe Gafni and Yaakov Litzman - attacked Yamina Chairman Naftali Bennett with unprecedented severity at a joint faction meeting at noon (Tuesday). Minister Aryeh Deri said: "A thing has happened in Israel. The Jewish state is in danger, it is about uprooting religion. Under the auspices of kippah-wearers, they are going to fulfill the long-standing dream of Meretz, Labor, the Reforms, and Liberman. The government headed by Bennett is going to destroy and annihilate the Jewish character and identity, everything that we have built here for 70 years - the identity of the Jewish state that allows us to live together. It will destroy the Holy Sabbath, the Chief Rabbinate, and kashrut." He added: "We, the Haredi parties, have always mocked them, that because of budgets for the Torah world we will enter every government, now it turns out that the government led by Bennett is throwing away all the values. I keep hearing briefings, 'Don't worry, we will take care of you.' I have known about these agreements for quite a few days, but I knew and expressed anxiety and shared it with my friends and the heads of United Torah Judaism, but of course I was also shocked when I saw it openly yesterday. "They say they have the right of veto. Who do we trust? Who in 2013 trampled on everything related to the Haredi world? Now will we trust? Then you were with Likud, today you are going to form a government with Meretz and Labor? Therefore, friends, there is a mitzvah not to be naive. When they spit on you, don't say it's rain." Deri addressed religious Zionists and Yamina voters: "Let's fight this evil government together." United Torah Judaism Chairman MK Moshe Gafni said at the opening of the joint faction meeting: "Atrocities have been committed in Israel. I have been in the Knesset for many years. I don't remember such a paper of defiance towards heaven, defiance towards everything holy and precious to the people of Israel. We came to Israel because the Torah said it was ours, that we had a right to it. "These papers that are circulating here with everyone - no Shabbat, no conversion, no education, no Torah, no purity of lineage, the supermarket law with precise details. Everything is circulating and this is defiance towards heaven, just defiance that we have no part and inheritance in the G-d of Israel. I don't remember such a paper." According to him, "There has never been a government that dared to do a tenth of the things that appear in these coalition agreements. Even during the time when Netanyahu went into coalition with the Bennett-Lapid Brotherhood Alliance, where evil people rot, they did not dare to do such a thing. "We will make a noise to heaven and earth about this behavior, of this man who supposedly wears a kippah, who from the beginning we knew that this is what he wanted, he wants an anti-religious secular government. He talks about the right of veto, when complete agreements are written with precise details of what the partnership agreement will look like, etc., the main thing is that he will be able to appoint rabbis. He is waiting for all these people with knitted kippahs to come to him and stand in line with him and wait for him to give them a position, to be head of a religious council, chief rabbi or neighborhood rabbi. We will not give them one. There will be a war over Yod's thorn. There will be nothing that this evil person can do." The United Torah Judaism chairman also attacked MK Ayelet Shaked: "She stands there and makes excuses, 'We will protect and do it,' where were the Haredi newspapers that let this matter pass? Everything was clear and on the table. I appeal to the voters of Yamina and religious Zionism - vomit, boycott and excommunicate these people from among you, so that you will have no part and inheritance with this group, so that you will not stand in line with them to beg to be a city or neighborhood rabbi." Gafni addressed the members of the new government: "Don't work on us, don't contact us. I appeal to you, the Haredi journalists: Don't give them a foothold. Judaism is not something that can be played with. Let them fly from our sight, they are Korach and his team, we have no partnership with them for anything, don't worry about us, the one who sits in heaven will take care of us and laugh at your nonsense. "No issue of Judaism can be harmed, and in what concerns the ultra-Orthodox and religious public, it cannot be harmed even by a millimeter. Shas, United Torah Judaism, and other partners, along the way we will cooperate with them to fight to remove this evil government from the country." [Gallery]

Photo: Jonathan Zindel, Flash90

Housing Minister Yaakov Litzman said: "What we see before our eyes is an extreme left-wing government that has lost its way, lost its values ​​and lost its conscience. The entire Jewish character in the country is in danger. The tradition of Israel, the values ​​of religion and the principles of Judaism are being thrown into the trash. Conversion, yeshiva students, the world of Torah, holy Sabbath, the Western Wall, recognition of Reformers, everything here has been hacked and is passing into the hands of the religion-haters Lieberman, Bennett and Lapid." He added: "The Sages say that since a person has committed a crime and a year in which it is done to him as a permit. The first time Bennett made a 'brotherly covenant' with Lapid, he said I was wrong and it will not happen again. We believed him. Today we already see what value his promises and statements have. Not only do we no longer believe him, but we understand that even the previous time it was planned and not a mistake." Litzman continued: "We made a promise to our voters and we are faithful to our promises. Not like Bennett, Lapid and others. We have principles and will not give up on them. United Torah Judaism promised not to go with Lapid and Lieberman, and we stand by that unequivocally. We are going into opposition with great pride and with our heads held high. We will bring down this evil government, just as we brought down the previous government formed by Bennett and Lapid." He emphasized: "Don't believe the right wing who write that the status quo in religion and state will remain. No one believes your promises. You also promised not to sit with Lapid, and not to move to the left, and you betrayed them. "In light of the coalition agreements that include an attack on everything holy and precious to us, I am here to say to Naftali Bennett: You don't have to hide the kippa, you can take it off, like your partner and friend Yair Lapid. It is great impudence to wear it after the agreements you signed. What is the difference between him and a gentile? He wears a kippa. I call on him to take off his kippah so that everyone will understand that he is a reformist." Resolutions of the joint faction meeting of Shas and United Torah Judaism: The factions read with astonishment the published coalition agreements, according to which the government being formed will dismantle any Jewish symbols. Our right to the Land of Israel is by virtue of the Torah. The separation from the Sabbath, the status of yeshiva students, purity of lineage, conversion, kashrut, the world of the Torah, and pure education, constitute a spiritual and physical danger to the inhabitants of the Holy Land. The factions will act jointly in all ways at their disposal, by publishing in Israel and abroad, to warn of the danger. The factions will fight a joint struggle in every parliamentary and extra-parliamentary way, lest they succeed in their plot to realize the goals of the secular left-wing government! Prayer to the Creator of the World that their thoughts and desires may not come to fruition. The factions call on everyone who has the influence to prevent this blasphemy, or who has influence over the members of Knesset who are preparing to become partners in this malicious government, to come to the aid of God in heroes.