They are willing to pay any security price merely for the joy they will have in seeing the settlers uprooted.
MKs Tzvi Hendel and Yitzchak Levy, both of the National Union party, call upon the Shas and Yisrael Beiteinu (Israel Our Home) parties to quit the government.  They say that otherwise, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert will continue towards uprooting tens of thousands of Jews from Judea and Samaria in order to make way for a Palestinian state.

MK Hendel wrote as follows in the weekly B'Sheva newspaper:

"This week, in the Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, we received yet another careful and precise analysis from the head of IDF Intelligence, stating clearly that without IDF control of Judea and Samaria, Hamas would be able to take over the territory within a short time and repeat the success it had in Gaza.  One need not be a great strategist to understand what an IDF retreat means: Hamas moves towards building a full-fledged army, placing an existential threat upon most of the country's citizens, from the Beit She'an Valley to Be'er Sheva.

"The only way to explain this mad rush towards reaching an agreement that will lead to the above scenario is that [Olmert wishes to] placate the extremist left, which still controls the media and judicial elite, in its hatred of the settlers.  They are willing to pay any security price merely for the joy they will have in seeing the settlers uprooted.

"...But amidst this insane post-Zionist reality, I am most amazed at my friends from Shas and Yisrael Beiteinu who continue to define themselves as belonging to the nationalist camp.  They can easily stop this madness by announcing their resignation from the coalition; this will topple the government, lead to early elections, and stop the process of destruction.  But for some reason, these two parties are ignoring their political strength, continuing to stride arm-in-arm with Olmert towards the dangerous horizon."

Hendel added that when he discusses this topic with his friends from these parties, they bring up past history -  when the National Union remained in the Sharon government even after the Disengagement plan was on the table.  Hendel said this is a lie:

"We remained only for as long as we had a majority - including the Likud ministers who promised to vote against the plan if the Likud party popular referendum would turn it down.  But then Sharon betrayed his promise and ignored the Likud membership's vote, and fired two National Union ministers, and one NRP minister quit as well - and only then was Sharon able to obtain his majority... I advise us all not to rely on distorted historical claims, and to unite in calling for Shas and Yisrael Beiteinu to quit and help topple Olmert.  We will thus be able to stop this insane plan of uprooting us from the towns of Judea and Samaria."

MK Levy
MK Yitzchak Levy, speaking with Arutz-7's Yigal Shok on Sunday, said, "Even Olmert, [Foreign Minister] Livni and Ramon [the Cabinet minister who is leading the drive to give eastern Jerusalem away] know that this whole idea of reaching an agreement with Abu Mazen [Abbas] is not realistic.  But they're doing it in order to create an 'atmosphere' of optimism - one fraught with danger for us.  Shas and Yisrael Beiteinu should be out of there; it's their presence that's keeping this government going, when truly they could be helping to form a different, more nationalist government."

Shok said, "They claim that by their presence, they're helping thwart plans to give away land."

Levy: "As members of a government, they are not there to thwart things that everyone knows they cannot thwart. They are a minority!  Rather, they are full partners in all the government's decisions, such as today's decision to release another 90 terrorists... Yes, it could be that their presence has some benefit in terms of the outposts in Judea and Samaria, but this small benefit is not worth the damage being caused by their enabling this government to continue to exist.  This government is trying to give a sense that things are moving, and that things are going well - when in fact we have seen before that these kinds of illusions are dangerous, and that when they blow up, they explode very harmfully."