Eleven leading organizations from the nationalist camp on Sunday issued a call to the leaders of three nationalist parties to put their personal differences aside and join together to form a government that is not reliant on anti-Zionist parties (or on Avigdor Liberman).
“We, organizations from the nationalist camp, call on the leaders of the Zionist parties from the Right and the Left to reject the possibility of forming a government that’s supported from within or without by parties that don’t recognize Israel’s right to exist as the nation-state of the Jewish People,” wrote the eleven groups, under the heading: “National Government or National Jeopardy.”
“Any party whose members support terrorism must be rejected outright, whether it’s the Ra’am party of the Islamic Movement or the Joint Arab List Arab List,” the manifesto continued, and concluded: “All parties should reconcile with their political rivals because, at the end of the day, the only thing that’s important is the Jewish state and Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel.”
The signatory groups include Im Tirtzu, Regavim, Professors for a Strong Israel, Cafe Shapira Forum, Choosing Life Forum of Bereaved Families, My Israel, Headquarters for the South Tel-Aviv Struggle, Wounded IDF Veterans Forum, Lach Yerushalayim, Lavi, and Yozma Ezrachit (civic initiative).
Matan Peleg, CEO of Im Tirtzu that initiated the move, said that the letter was a wake-up call to the heads of the Zionist parties.
“Our elected officials need to wake up and understand that they are leading the country down a path of selling out its Zionist values for no justifiable reason,” Peleg warned. “The nationalist camp has a clear majority to form a stable government. We are calling on Benjamin Netanyahu, Gideon Sa’ar, and Naftali Bennett to take responsibility. The good of the country needs to come first, not personal emotions and mutual hatred.”
Professor Asher Yahalom, head of the Professors for a Strong Israel organization, said that the leaders of the nationalist camp need to “put the interests of the Jewish People first.” My Israel head Sara Haetzni-Cohen said that “the challenges abroad and at home require the establishment of a nationalist government.”
Meir Deutsch, head of Regavim, said that “whoever is willing to sit in a coalition with those who do not recognize Israel as a Jewish and democratic state isn’t a Zionist. All the spins and twists will not obscure this ethical matter.”
The Jewish Press noted on Sunday morning (Netanyahu, Lapid, Can’t Get the President’s Nod Without Bennett, Sa’ar, Mansour) that Likud officials have been meeting with members of Bennett’s party, including Ayelet Shaked and Alon Davidi, to try to convince them to join Netanyahu. The only problem is—as Shaked remembers well—that Netanyahu will not agree to be the left-most faction in his own coalition government and will most certainly invite Benny Gantz to join him with Blue&White’s 8 mandates, at which point who know what would happen to Shaked’s aspirations to retake the Justice Ministry or Bennett’s yearnings for Finance or Defense.