Opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu today (Monday) referred to coalition chairman Idit Silman's remarks that she was attacked near a gas station.
"Yesterday we received further proof, if anyone needed it, that Yamina is really left-wing. For years we have been fighting against false plots designed to tarnish an entire camp. Against the incessant incitement to turn all of us, the voters of the right into a herd of goats, inferiors, instigators, baboons, bots, and anything else. And here comes the chairman of the coalition and tells a story that may very well not have been and may not have happened with the aim of discrediting an entire public," Netanyahu said at the start of the weekly Likud faction meeting.
Netanyahu called on MK Silman to "provide evidence for the event she described, or she will immediately apologize to the two million Israeli citizens from the national camp she defamed."
"I promise her and the people of Israel one thing - we will continue to look for any way to overthrow this evil government as soon as possible and bring back a true right-wing government that engages in a sharp, genuine, respectful debate - and above all respects the eternal values of the people of Israel. It's us and it's not them.
"We saw yesterday that a Yamina MK called MK Amichai Chikli, a Yamina MK who did not vote for the budget because of its content, a 'virus.' Do you remember how in the 1930s, when the Jewish people were called a 'virus?' Imagine what would have happened if she called someone from the left a 'virus?' What a shout would have rung out. What a fuss. What a commotion would break out and rightly so. And Prime Minister Bennett, who constantly preaches respectful discourse, has not intervened and even sent an MK from his faction to support this outrageous statement. It is an unbelievable low that they have reached. But if we’re already talking about MK Chikli in the context of the virus, it’s too bad he’s not also infectious," Netanyahu said.