The leaders of the Otzmah Yehudit, party, Dr. Michael Ben-Ari and attorney Itamar Ben-Gvir have strongly criticized how the Jewish Home party has handled the controversy over Amona.
In the version of the Regulation Law that Jewish Home leader, Naftali Bennett worked out with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, there would be no retroactive clause saving Amona from its imminent evacuation.
On the “Pass from the Right” radio show on the Galey Israel station, Ben-Ari stated “There is no victory here. It’s a mockery. Homes are being uprooted in the Land of Israel, and there’s no difference between the Jewish Home party and Kadima. This is not a real-estate issue that, per some arrangement, can state that Amona is not ours or that the Land of Israel is not ours.”
Attorney Ben-Gvir said that the only ones who deserve a compliment is this situation are the public relations people working for Naftali Bennett, who presented this arrangement as a victory. “He (Bennett) said, ‘We will build, and the Left can scream,” but it’s a joke on all of us. He stuck a knife in the back of Jewish settlement.
“Amona, God forbid, will be uprooted. The Path of the Patriarchs, God forbid will be uprooted. Nine homes in Ofra, God forbid, will be uprooted, and in the end the Regulation Law itself will be nullified by the Supreme Court, and Naftali Bennett is telling everyone that he won.”
According to Ben-Ari the whole arrangement with the government is a desecration of God’s name. “The difference between Betzalel Smotrich and Tzipi Livni in this matter is less than a hair. Smotrich claims that we’re still on the mountain, and this is exactly Tzipi Livni’s claim that we can evacuate Jewish settlements but remain in the Land of Israel.”
The two explained that in recent months, they’ve Jewish Home party members, like Rabbi Eli Ben-Dahan, who said that if there’s no Amona, then there will be no government. “We supported Bennett, Uri Ariel, and the other members of Tekuma (a faction of the Jewish Home party), but to our sorrow, all our hopes were disappointed. The people of Jewish Home have damaged the Land of Israel.”