Likud Minister Zeev Elkin called on Yisrael Beytenu Chairman MK Avigdor Liberman to take advantage of the coming hours to find solutions to the issues he raised, solutions that Elkin believes are easily attainable.
In an interview with Hadashot Haboker on Channel 12 News, Elkin said that while the haredi parties have made compromises on 80 percent, or even more, of their demands, Liberman is not willing to take the small step required of him.
Elkin also noted that, from past experience, he can say that when Liberman let his negotiating teams reach compromises and agreements in previous crises, his people reached solutions.
"Always when Liberman gave an order to his negotiating team to find a solution, a creative solution was found," Elkin said, adding that, to the best of his knowledge, "in the hours that remain, just as they reached agreements on all the other issues, it is possible to find a creative solution to the draft issue if Liberman gives the order to be flexible. If the approach is that no detail will be changed and we want the haredim to give up everything 100 percent, it will not happen. The haredim have shown flexibility and are ready for more flexibility, but Yisrael Beytenu should also take the step and show flexibility of 10 percent.”
On the other hand, MK Oded Forer, head of Liberman's negotiating team, claimed that while the parties had talked about the various issues and progress had been achieved, they had not reached a conclusion. Elkin stated that "there is a solution to everything else." The two expressed their agreement to continue holding joint discussions during the hours that remained until the second and third readings on the dissolution of the Knesset. "The compromise proposal they set before us is neither serious nor genuine. I am willing to sit and talk, but there must be understanding and willingness on all sides," Forer said.