Chronicle Editor
Jerusalem — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has urged his coalition partners not to bring down the government, saying holding snap elections now would be “irresponsible”.
Netanyahu made the remarks in a televised statement on Sunday, after meeting Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon, a key coalition partner.
The meeting was seen as a last attempt to prevent the collapse of the coalition – which currently has a one-seat majority in parliament – but ended with no conclusion.
Netanyahu’s government was thrown into crisis earlier this week when hardline Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman resigned over a ceasefire agreement with Hamas, the group administering the besieged Gaza Strip.
Naming himself as defence chief, Netanyahu said in his televised address that “there is no place for politics or personal considerations” when it comes to Israel’s security.
Following Lieberman’s resignation, the right-wing Jewish Home party had said that it would also leave the coalition unless its party leader, Education Minister Naftali Bennet, took on the post of defence minister – a move reportedly supported by Kahlon, the leader of Kulanu party.
A coalition collapse would move national elections to the spring of 2019, well ahead of its original date in November next year.
This prospect came closer on Wednesday when Lieberman announced that his Yisrael Beiteinu party would leave the ruling coalition due to Netanyahu’s “surrender to terrorism”, referring to the ceasefire in Gaza agreed between Israel and Hamas-led factions the previous day.
Lieberman called the Egyptian-mediated truce “a capitulation to terror” and demanded harsher retaliation.—Al Jazeera.
Online Reporter