MK Ofer Shelah, one of the senior members of the Blue and White party, on Saturday accused Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu of striving for a third election.
"We made every effort to set up a government and not be dragged into elections, but from day one, Netanyahu was solely focused on another election," Shelah said at an event in Be’er Sheva.
The Likud negotiating team refused to compromise on three issues, he added. Those issues, he said, were "Netanyahu being first [to serve as Prime Minister] in the rotation, a 55-member immunity bloc and zero changes on things that are important to us, especially the protection of the rule of law and issues of religious and state. It was not a negotiation but a game of wasting time and making accusations.”
Shelah brushed off Netanyahu's statement that he should be first in a rotation in order to allow for the application of sovereignty in the Jordan Valley and the signing of a defense agreement with US President Donald Trump.
"Bibi's political reasons for being first are empty of content. There will be no annexation of the Jordan Valley because of Jordan's opposition to such a move, and no defense pace with the US because it is a bad thing that all the professional systems oppose.”
"There has not yet been a Prime Minister who used political and security reasons for his political needs in such a disrespectful manner," Shelah charged.