Israel politics

Following Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s failure to cobble together a ruling coalition by Wednesday’s deadline, President Reuven Rivlin has tasked the opposition, led by Yesh Atid leader Yair Lapid, with a chance to form an alternative government.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is on his way to leading the opposition, a top Likud MK said Monday night, hours after the ruling party faced a stinging defeat in the vote on appointing the heads of a key Knesset committee.

Star of the progressive left Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) has come under fire for withdrawing from an event commemorating late-Israeli Prime Minister Yitzchak Rabin, including by Rabin’s own granddaughter who accused the Democratic congress woman of surrendering to populism.

Thousands of Israelis protested Saturday outside Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s official residence in Jerusalem as well as his private home in Caesarea, as part of ongoing demonstrations calling to unseat the premier over his handling of the coronavirus pandemic as well as the corruption charges facing him.

The radical New Israel Fund (NIF) has warned Israelis to turn off cellphones before attending anti-Netanyahu protests because they are used for “tracking purposes,” as well as instructing protesters how to act in the event of arrest.

TEL AVIV — Israel has a “historic opportunity” to annex Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Israel must jump at the opportunity come July, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday.

TEL AVIV — Israel “should be deeply ashamed” for putting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on trial for trying to obtain favorable media coverage, Harvard Law School professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz, who served on President Donald Trump’s defense team in the impeachment trial, said Sunday.

TEL AVIV – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday said he was being framed in an “attempted political coup” at the start of his corruption trial as he became the first Israeli leader to face criminal indictment while in office.

TEL AVIV – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to apply Israel sovereignty over Jewish settlements in the West Bank ahead of the swearing-in ceremony of Israel’s 35th government, ending nearly 16 months of political deadlock.

TEL AVIV – The new Israeli government, set to be sworn in on Thursday evening, has “the right and the obligation” to decide if and how it wants to apply sovereignty over Jewish settlements in the West Bank, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Wednesday as he wrapped up a six-hour visit to Jerusalem.

TEL AVIV – Likud MK Yuli Edelstein accepted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s appointment as health minister Tuesday evening.

TEL AVIV – The High Court of Justice unanimously rejected petitions about whether to allow Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to form the next government despite his indictment in three corruption cases, allowing him to go ahead with the controversial rotational unity coalition deal signed with Blue and White chief Benny Gantz. 

TEL AVIV – Israel’s High Court of Justice on Sunday held the first hearing, which was broadcast live on television, about whether to allow Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to form the next government despite his indictment in three corruption cases.

TEL AVIV – Israel on Sunday once again found itself embroiled in a political deadlock after President Reuven Rivlin denied Blue and White leader Benny Gantz’s request for a 14-day extension to form a government. 

TEL AVIV – In an unlikely show of camaraderie, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and main rival Blue and White head Benny Gantz shared an affectionate moment on social media over a coronavirus post, prompting reluctant umpire President Reuven Rivlin to urge the two party heads to continue the solidarity offline as well. 

TEL AVIV – Yisrael Beitenu leader and election kingmaker Avigdor Liberman on Thursday added his voice to the chorus of support for Blue and White’s proposed legislation to unseat Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, on the grounds an indicted prime minister should be barred from office. 

TEL AVIV – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ruling Likud party has inched ahead of rival Blue and White in major polls taken days ahead of the national election. 

TEL AVIV – Prime Minister Netanyahu on Monday said coronavirus, which saw its second confirmed case among Israelis, is not a good enough reason to postpone the national elections set to take place next week.

TEL AVIV – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday warned against attempts to tamper with the electoral process ahead of next week’s poll through the dissemination of false reports about coronavirus. 

TEL AVIV – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday vowed to erase the criminal records of tens of thousands of Israelis caught in possession or using cannabis.

TEL AVIV – Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Monday slammed 106 House Democrats in a letter for their “foolish” fixation in thinking that settlements constitute a barrier to peace.

TEL AVIV – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu acquiesced Monday to demands that his Likud party hold primaries for the party leadership in the case that new elections are called, pitting the prime minister against his main challenger within the party MK Gideon Sa’ar. 

TEL AVIV – Speaking to a group of high ranking pro-Israel Christians on Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lauded Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s recent declaration that the U.S. no longer considers Jewish settlements in the West Bank unlawful. 

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday questioned the police’s conduct in confiscating the cellphones of his aides, who have been accused of hounding a state’s witness.

In a dramatic shift, the Joint List alliance of Arab-majority parties recommended Blue and White leader Benny Gantz for prime minister on Sunday, seemingly paving the way for the centrist party to get the first crack at assembling a coalition.

Benny Gantz’s Blue and White centrist party has opened a two-seat lead over Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud, according to updated voting results Thursday morning from the Central Election Committee.

Blue and White leader Benny Gantz on Thursday dismissed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s offer of a unity government that includes all the religious right-wing parties, insisting that the next coalition should have himself as prime minister, not Netanyahu, and be committed to liberal policies on religious issues.

The Central Elections Committee began counting the final votes early Thursday morning, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his main challenger, Benny Gantz, still caught in an apparent deadlock.

TEL AVIV – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu requested Likud’s top 40 Knesset candidates – all of whom capitulated – to sign a pledge promising not to oust him after the elections.

TEL AVIV – Former prime minister Ehud Barak has come under fire from both Israelis and Americans on both sides of the political aisle for the choice of name for his newly formed Israel Democratic Party.

TEL AVIV — In a first, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro made history by joining Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the Western Wall on Monday.

TEL AVIV – Blue and White leader Benny Gantz and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s main election rival said he is “not sure” about any of the three senior partners in his party, in a bombshell recording leaked to the Israeli press.

TEL AVIV – A majority of Israelis believe Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will beat his main political rival Benny Gantz in April’s elections and serve another term, tie David Ben-Gurion and become the longest-serving prime minister in Israel’s history, a new poll aired Monday showed.

TEL AVIV – President Donald Trump came to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s defense Thursday as the latter awaited an announcement on whether he will be indicted on corruption charges, saying the Israeli premier was “tough, smart, and strong.”

After marathon, all-night talks, the leaders of the two top-polling centrist parties, Benny Gantz and Yair Lapid, announced Thursday that they had agreed to merge their party lists to challenge Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s frontrunning Likud in the upcoming elections.

TEL AVIV – A senior Israeli official on Monday urged the attorney general not to be influenced by the media or the political left, who might lead him to make a rash decision regarding an indictment against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ahead of the April 9 elections. 

TEL AVIV – The Palestinian Authority has warned that Israel’s decision to implement legislation to cut off funding to the PA over its so-called pay-for-slay scheme will result in anarchy in the West Bank, with PA President Mahmoud Abbas saying that if Israel deducts even “one penny” from tax monies owed to the PA, the PA would not accept the money transfers. 

TEL AVIV – Taking a leaf out of then-GOP candidate Donald Trump, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has launched a Likud Party TV channel on Facebook, in what claims to be an attempt to “throw the ‘fake’ out of the news.” 

TEL AVIV – An oversized billboard of President Donald Trump shaking hands with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was visible on Sunday from Tel Aviv’s main highway as part of the prime minister’s reelection campaign. 

Television polls published Wednesday indicated that Labor leader Avi Gabbay’s public termination of his partnership with Tzipi Livni’s Hatnua party damaged his party’s standing in the eyes of the Israeli public.