Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may have called on Yamina head Naftali Bennett and New Hope leader Gideon Sa'ar to come home, Wednesday, but he has other plans.
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His speech wasn't aimed at bringing, Sa'ar, the Likud party's wayward son, back into the fold of the nationalist camp, but rather at laying the ground for an entirely different kind of government that doesn't include Sa'ar at all. It remains unclear whether this will be accomplished through defectors joining Likud or the outside support of Ra'am.
Netanyahu may also just be trying to torpedo the center-left's attempts to form a coalition.
The political leader with the best chance of forming a coalition that replaces Netanyahu is not Yesh Atid head Yair Lapid but Bennett. Senior Likud officials spent all day, Wednesday, doing everything they could to prevent that from happening. Yisrael Beytenu head Avigdor Lieberman, a staunch opponent of Netanyahu, has assisted their efforts by informing Lapid he will flat-out refuse such a move. Lieberman has denied reports to this effect.
Although publicly, Lapid has said he would agree to Bennett forming the coalition, his party has said nothing of the kind to Bennett or any of his fellow Yamina members. It seems Lapid is so wrapped up in the belief that he should be tasked with forming the next government that he's simply incapable of considering any other scenario. After all, he already made the concession of his life to Blue and White leader Benny Gantz, not once, but three separate times. Having garnered twice the number of Yamina's Knesset seats, it's easy to see why he would find it difficult to cede the right to form the next coalition government this time around.
So, for now, Bennett waits. He isn't expected to say anything significant before Passover comes to an end, Saturday night. He's spent most of the holiday in the Judean Desert with his family. Now and again, he'll be in contact with a Lapid ally or a member of the Netanyahu camp, but he never states his intentions outright. It appears Bennett's top priority is to be tasked with forming the next coalition. If he can't have that, he'll likely look to join up with Netanyahu, in the hope of avoiding any further political escapades. The only problem with that tactic is that any alliance with Netanyahu will be an adventure, as the prime minister has yet to garner the support of 61 lawmakers he needs to form the next government.
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