It’s a fact: Benny Gantz simply does not have enough votes to form a minority government.
The only thing his Blue White party can do in the coming weeks is try to pass legislation specifically against Netanyahu and similar incendiary legislation.
And this while we face an unprecedented crisis.
Live on Channel 12 Saturday night, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu laid out an extremely reasonable offer to Benny Gantz.
According to details of the proposed deal, Likud would start out with the posts of prime minister, finance minister and Knesset speaker and Blue and White would start with a deputy prime minister, defense minister and foreign minister and then the prime minister would be switched along with the ministers after a year and a half.
The Justice portfolio, a bone of contention, would be filled in agreement by an outsider (not an MK) or a minister and deputy from each party.
Correction: it is a FANTASTIC DEAL.
The last thing any party needs is the finance ministry portfolio. No matter what miracles the finance minister may somehow pull off it's going to be a thankless job.
Ditto for the position of prime minister.
For a moment there was hope.
And then former defense minister Ya'alon, a member of the Blue White "cockpit", began sputtering his hatred of Netanyahu in a live follow up interview on Channel 12, essentially ruling out any solution.
I understand the source of Ya'alon's hysterical attitude towards Netanyahu.
Ya'alon, in the past, made a tremendous investment in the Likud, devoting a huge part of his time in personal contact with Likudniks.
As a member of the Likud Central Committee I participated in meetings with him many times in Raanana and even at his office in the Defense Ministry in Tel Aviv. He always made a point to stick around until everyone had a chance to personally say something to him. To be clear, he wasn't meeting us to exchange ideas. The idea was to gain our support by giving us the bragging rights of personally knowing him.
And then came the Elor Azariya incident in Hevron.
Both Ya'alon and Netanyahu responded immediately to the incident with statements condemning Azariya.
The Likud WhatsApp groups were furious about these hasty condemnations.
Netanyahu immediately did an about face.
But Ya'alon is a general.
And generals like Ya'alon are convinced that they are infallible.
Ya'alon didn't back down - he doubled down.
From that moment onward an hysterical hatred for Netanyahu consumed Ya'alon.
And the rest is history.
I frankly don't think that Ya'alon has it in him to put the nation ahead of his hatred for Netanyahu. But that doesn’t mean that Gantz can't put Israel first, as his campaign slogan promised.
Jewish history is replete with stories of people whose emotional decisions had a devastating effect on the fate of the Jewish People.
I sincerely hope that Benny Gantz steers away from that path and takes up Netanyahu on his offer.
Reposted with permission from IMRA - Independent Media Review and Analysis www.i[email protected]