The Knesset plenum convened this morning (Tuesday) and elected MK Yariv Levin of the Likud, who is supported by all coalition factions, as Speaker of the 25th Knesset, and elected MK Yariv Levin to the position.
MK Yariv Levin was supported by 64 MKs. MK Meirav Ben Ari was supported by 45 MKs. MK Ayman Odeh was supported by 5 MKs.
Incoming Knesset Speaker Yariv Levin received the gavel from outgoing Knesset Speaker Mickey Levy, took his place on the chair and delivered a speech: "I thank the Speaker of the twenty-fourth Knesset, MK Mickey Levy. Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to thank you for the trust placed in me. I would like to express special thanks to you, Prime Minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu, for the privilege of walking with you on a long-standing joint path and for the personal trust and extraordinary support that I receive from you.
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""Honorable members of the Knesset, I will do my best to fulfill this mission of mine, in the way that my parents, Gail of blessed memory and Aryeh Yadvel, raised me for a long life. A way of absolute commitment to the people of Israel, to the heritage of our ancestors, and to the realization of our inalienable right to the Land of Israel. I will do this out of a deep recognition of the importance of the Knesset, as a home for all citizens of Israel, and especially the weakest among them, as my dear father-in-law, MK Yaakov Shamai, of blessed memory, taught me.".
""Ladies and gentlemen, I could not have done any of my public activities without the support and help of my beloved wife Yifat, and without the backing I receive from my children Idan, Niv, and Adi. My deep gratitude and much love are due to them.
""Honorable Members of the Knesset, I hope that the 25th Knesset will be a Knesset that will fulfill its days and that a stable government will soon be established in Israel. We will need to make a joint effort to strengthen the Knesset's status as the legislative authority, a status that has been greatly damaged in recent times. We will need to ensure that the mandate given to us by the public will indeed be realized, and that governance will exist that is an important and necessary expression of the democratic system.
""We are privileged to be able to serve in the Knesset as representatives of the entire people. Our work here is also carried out thanks to the dedicated work of all Knesset employees, to whom we are grateful. I would also like to express my gratitude to the excellent team that has been working with me for years.".
""Ladies and gentlemen, we have very busy working days ahead of us in the coming days. I would like to address the expected agenda, as currently known. We will now take a break, during which I would like to invite the members of the Knesset Presidency to a meeting in an hour in my office. There will also be a meeting of the Organizing Committee in accordance with the agenda published by it. The plenary session will be resumed with half an hour's notice, for the purpose of discussing bills in preliminary reading, to the extent that this is approved by the Knesset Presidency and subject to the granting of an exemption from the obligation to give a discount by the Organizing Committee.""
The vote was supposed to take place yesterday and was postponed for almost a day after the opposition threatened to stretch the discussions until early morning.
At the same time, the Ministerial Committee for Legislative Affairs will convene today to discuss the two laws, the 'Ben Gvir Law' and the 'Deri Law', and two additional laws: one defining the powers of an additional minister in the Ministry of Defense and the other on eliminating the possibility of splitting 4 Knesset members from their faction.
Yesh Atid chairman Yair Lapid spoke in the Knesset plenary ahead of the vote on replacing the Knesset speaker - and said: "I want to ask this mother who voted for Likud. Is that what you wanted? When you stood at the polling station and cast a ballot for Mehal, is that what you voted for? Is that what you wanted? That with your vote the most extreme government in the history of the country would be established?"
'"How do you feel about the fact that the first promise of the new government, the first thing they agreed on, is to pay yeshiva students more money than IDF soldiers? How do you feel about the fact that public transportation in your city will cost more, just because you're not Haredi. Because that's part of the agreements. In Haredi cities, they will pay less for public transportation. Why, like that. Because they can.".
Lapid added: "Our government raised the salaries of IDF soldiers by 50%, the new government prefers to give the money - your taxes - to eighteen-year-olds to ensure that they do not enlist and do not work. I am not willing to give you ownership of Judaism. It is not yours. You are no more Jewish than we are. The Western Wall is also ours, the Kiddush on Shabbat Eve is also ours, Netzah Israel is ours for all of us.".
'"This is not a Likud government, this is certainly not a Netanyahu government. Netanyahu is weak, terrified of his trial, he has been taken over by people younger than him, more extremist and determined than him. Smotrich and Deri control this government. Netanyahu is a junior partner.".
'"You won the election, I don't argue with that, but you did not win and will not win Israeli democracy. The independence of the courts is not subject to the results of the election. Criminal cases are not subject to the results of the election. Women's rights are not subject to the results of the election.
'"We are not your friars. We are not here just to pay taxes and send our children to the army.".
""We love this country no less than you, and we are Jews no less than you, and we will not let you destroy our democracy. We will fight for it, and we will not give up our beloved country to them. This is political life. Sometimes you are up, sometimes you are down, but you never, never, never, never, never give up. It will be hard, so we will work harder. It will be challenging, so we will fight harder," Lapid added.
Benjamin Netanyahu told the opposition plenum:
""I call on members of the opposition to accept the people's decision in the elections and stop spreading scaremongering and lies. I heard the outgoing prime minister say, 'We only pay taxes and we only serve in the army.' I don't think comparisons should be made, but if Yair Lapid insists, I suggest he do a simple calculation: 32 Likud seats represent a public that serves entirely in the army, 12 seats from Religious Zionism and Otzma Yehudit all serve in the army, a very large number of Shas voters serve in the army, not to mention the Haredi public that serves in essential services and rescue. That's 50 seats that serve, and your public has 46 seats. The attempt to divide and divide is fundamentally wrong.
""There is and will be electricity on Shabbat, there are and will be beaches for everyone. We will maintain the status quo - everyone will live in their faith. There will not be a Halacha state here, there will be a state that will take care of all citizens of Israel without exception. We were elected to lead in our own way, the way of the national right and the way of the liberal right, and that is what we will do.".
