MK Elazar Stern (Yesh Atid) on Tuesday morning told Army Radio that his party has weighed the option of a mass resignation of all the opposition parties so that the coalition government would be left all alone, and this way lose its legitimacy.
Yesh Atid MK Debbie Biton confirmed that the idea had been mulled by Opposition Chairman MK Lapid and his associates. Speaking to FM 104.5, Biton said: “A collective resignation of the opposition? We discussed it. The issue is still on the agenda.”
Labor MK Efrat Rayten Marom told Army Radio: “The idea is familiar to us in the Labor Party as well, no option is ruled out.”
Stern noted that the reason why the idea of “collective resignations” has not entered the operational phase was not that the opposition parties, like everyone else in the Knesset, are there to serve their voters, but because Lapid doesn’t trust his coalition partners to honor such a move.
You have to admit this is hilarious. Too suspicious to act on his rage is so Yair Lapid.
I searched the Knesset rules, and they do deal with a situation whereby an MK is absent from the house, in the context of maternity leave. The Knesset Ethics Committee calls on the faction chairs to respect the MK’s leave and allow her to resume her duties when she is ready. The committee calls this a special situation whereby the Knesset must continue to function with fewer than 120 members.
Section 3 of the rules of ethics for members of the Knesset establishes that the member of the Knesset will devote all of his time to fulfilling his duties as a member of the Knesset, and during this time he will prioritize the fulfillment of his duties over any other occupation. It’s safe to assume, then, that neither the legislator nor the ethics committee envisioned the mass resignation of close to half the MKs.
I kept the best part for last: should a member of the Knesset decide to resign, he or she must inform the Speaker of the Knesset immediately, even if they happen to be outside the country. Now comes the precious part: as soon as the position of the member of the Knesset has become vacant, the Speaker sends a written invitation to the candidate that follows him on his party’s election slate, to come and be sworn in.
In other words, should Yair Lapid and all the members of his faction decide to resign – it won’t be up to them to decide what would be done with their vacant seats, it would be handed by the Speaker to the next person on their party’s election list.
Does Yair Lapid believe that the people he placed in the less realistic slots before the election would agree to miss out on the opportunity of a lifetime to get their own office in the Knesset, a great salary, and all the perks of an MK?
At which point, Dirty Harry (pointing a .44 Magnum, “the most powerful handgun in the world”) would say to the Yesh Atid Chairman: “Ya gotta ask yourself one question: ‘Do I feel lucky?’ Well, do ya, punk?”
