PRESS RELEASE
Israelis Seek Options To Unseat Netanyahu and Save Israel
Dec. 5, 2014 (EIRNS)—With new Israeli elections scheduled for March 2015, some people are looking to assure that Benjamin Netanyahu is not reelected as Prime Minister. First it is now reported that a significant group of Likud members have made moves to oust Netanyahu as head of the Likud prior to elections. They approached former Interior Minister Gideon Sa’ar, who recently resigned from Netanyahu’s government and from the Knesset. He is considered second only to Netanyahu in the party, and is part of a new and young generation of Likud MKs. He is said to have not rejected the offer, and will make a decision soon.
More interesting is a proposal by veteran peace activist Uri Avnery, who calls for the formation of a "government of national emergency" as the only way to save Israel from an otherwise imminent catastrophe.
In his latest weekly comment, Avnery wrote that Netanyahu’s government fell because "Israelis are fed up with Benjamin Netanyahu. They are fed up with the government. They are fed up with all political parties. They are fed up with themselves. They are fed up." He outlines the catastrophic situation Netanyahu has created by destroying the peace process, turning Israel into a racist state and a social disaster, and that the only way out is to form a government of national salvation. This would mean uniting in an electoral bloc all the left-wing and centrist parties.
"This would include the Labor Party and Me’eretz, Yair Lapid’s ’There Is a Future,’ and Tzipi Livni’s ’The Movement,’ as well as the new party-in-the-making of Moshe Kahlon, the communist Hadash and the Arab parties. It should also ask for the support of all the peace and human rights organizations."
He uses the example of Ariel Sharon’s creation of the Likud as a precedent. "In the political annals of Israel, there is an example. When Ariel Sharon left the army in 1973, he created the Likud by uniting Menachem Begin’s Freedom Party, the Liberals, and two small splinter parties. I asked him about the sense of this. The Freedom and Liberal parties were already united in a joint Knesset faction, the two tiny parties were doomed anyhow.
"’You don’t understand,’ he replied. ’The important thing is to convince the voters that the entire right-wing is now united, with nobody left out.’"
Avnery writes that if there is a mobilization, not only of these parties, but also the general population, including cultural figures, activists, etc., there is a real possibility that this would be possible. He concludes:
"These coming elections must turn into a national plebiscite, a clear choice between two very different Israeli states: a racist Israel of inequality, engaged in an endless war and increasingly subject to the rule of fundamentalist rabbis; or a democratic Israel that seeks peace with Palestine and the entire Arab and Muslim world and equality between all citizens, irrespective of sex, nation, religion, language, and community. In such a contest, I believe that we shall win."
