The coalition again fails to achieve a majority: the dramatic law was postponed for a week

May 30, 2022   

After the leaders of the Netanyahu bloc declared today (Monday) that they will overwhelmingly oppose any coalition law "with the aim of immediately overturning it," the faltering coalition was forced to withdraw several bills. These are bills that are controversial within the coalition, which needs the opposition's votes in order to pass them. Thus, the coalition was supposed to put to a vote the extension of the 'Temporary Order: Applying Israeli Law in Judea and Samaria', but due to the lack of a majority, since Meretz and Ra'am oppose the law, Justice Minister Gideon Sa'ar was forced to postpone the vote by a week. This is a temporary order that is extended every 5 years, with dramatic consequences: Israelis will not be able to be tried in Israeli courts for offenses they committed in Judea and Samaria, and the Tax Authority, the Center for Fines Collection, and the enforcement authorities will also lose their authority to operate in Judea and Samaria. The vote on Yesh Atid's bill on expanding welfare services for people with disabilities was also postponed by a week, in order to ensure a majority for it. Coalition MKs were told that only proposals on which there are individual summaries with opposition MKs would be put forward, and that each MK is responsible for achieving a majority for his own laws. As reported earlier, the leaders of the Netanyahu bloc parties – Likud, Religious Zionism, Shas and United Torah Judaism – announced this afternoon their sweeping opposition to every law of the coalition. Religious Zionism Chairman, MK Bezalel Smotrich: 'The coalition repeatedly reaches out to the opposition and demands that it pass the laws that Tibi and Abbas do not approve of them passing and asks us to help them wash away their sins, so that they can hide the enormous and long-term disaster they are inflicting on Israel. We will not revive the government because it is neither Zionist nor legitimate.' Smotrich added: "The people of Israel expect us to send all of its opportunistic members, the value-traffickers, to the dustbin of history, and that is what we will do. The opposition will act responsibly: the most responsible act is to overthrow the government. Therefore, we will pursue a policy of zero cooperation and maximum effort to overthrow the government of nightmare and establish a Jewish and Zionist government soon.".