MK Moshe Gafni, who heads the Degel Hatorah faction of the United Torah Judaism party, on Sunday night said that he does not bicker with Shas chief Aryeh Deri, and that the two see eye-to-eye on most issues.
"I always worked together with Deri, hand in hand," Gafni told Kol Hai Radio. "Our goals are to go with the right. I don't know what they write in the newspapers. The right-wing bloc works together, but I will continue to greet even those who are as far from us as east is from west. At the same time, I will fight with all my might against all those who disturb Judaism - Matan Kahana, [Yoaz] Hendel, and the others."
Gafni also attacked the current government's ministers, saying, "[Transportation Minister] Merav Michaeli (Labor) causes Sabbath desecration, [Agriculture Minister] Oded Forer (Yisrael Beytenu) wants raising pigs here to be allowed, they want to erase everything, they have forgotten what it means to be Jews."
When asked how he sees he young people who want to vote for the Religious Zionism party and its second-in-command MK Itamar Ben-Gvir, Gafni said, "First of all, Ben-Gvir ascends the Temple Mount. By doing so he violates what is written in all the rulings of Jewish law. This is a violation which invokes the punishment of dying early and childless. What will the people of Israel gain from all his yelling?"
"What does he do? He pulls out a gun and he yells, 'Death to terrorists.' Who knows what that could do, G-d forbid? There are security forces and it is their job to deal with this. He is not acting in accordance with Jewish law when it comes to the most serious issues.
"I and my comrades have not done and are not doing anything without asking the Torah sages. I say to the young men: If you want your vote to go to the sages of Israel, there is no reason to vote for others."
Regarding haredim who work, Gafni said, "The haredim who work are our own flesh and blood, there was a special section on this in the council's decisions. I help them in the Knesset."
"In the previous government, I brought proposals to help them. The coalition stopped this, that shows that they really don't want to help the haredi community, not even working haredim."
"I am also a working haredi," he added.
When asked about the government haredi schools, he said, "This is a complete deviation from the path. One day the parents who send there will see that their children are different than they thought. It's [former Education Minister] Shai Piron who did this, he wanted to eliminate the haredi community's pedagogical independence."
Regarding whether he would demand budgets for his community the way the United Arab List (Ra'am) did, Gafni responded, "It's important to clarify to the public: In order for money to reach the public, it needs to go through many processes. If it does not go through them, it does not come. I told that to [United Arab List chairman MK] Mansour Abbas and [Joint Arab List MK Ahmad] Tibi. They told me that I had become a star in the Arab sector. The things that I said in the plenum on the issue were translated into Arabic, the money did not reach the Arab citizens."
"We need a solution for the preschool teachers and the teachers, and for housing. I do not want 53 billion, I want solutions to all the problems, and it doesn't matter how much it costs."