The Ra'am party announced Sunday morning that it is likely that party members will not turn up on Wednesday for a vote initiated by the opposition on a bill to dissolve the Knesset and will continue to freeze their membership in the coalition, Channel 12 News reported.
If the Ra'am party goes through on its word, the opposition will be able to pass the bill to dissolve the Knesset as it will not need 61 votes to reach a majority.
However, the opposition fears that this is a trick by the Ra'am party and know that if the law is submitted and it fails in its preliminary reading, it will be frozen for six months. This is because, according to the Knesset's bylaws, which stipulates that an MK's bill that has not been approved by the plenum cannot be put to the vote for the next six months, unless there is a change of circumstances.
In the past, obtaining 61 signatures in favor of bringing the boll for a vote again constituted a change of circumstances, but the opposition prefers not to be dependent on the discretion of Knesset Speaker Mickey Levy.
Last night, Ra'am chairman MK Mansour Abbas published an Arabic-language post clarifying that whether his party remains in Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett's coalition will be decided based on understandings reached between Jordan and Israel.
In the post, Abbas clarified that both remaining in the coalition and his party's position on Al Aqsa mosque will be decided at the joint meeting between the two countries.
According to Abbas, he has already informed both Bennett and Foreign Minister Yair Lapid (Yesh Atid) of his intentions.