After two hours of talking about politics, lies, and disappointments, MK Amichai Chikli had enough. "We didn't even touch the most pressing issues, which are so much more important," he tells me. Suddenly, Chikli becomes animated, springs from his chair toward the whiteboard in the corner of his office then takes out a green dry-erase marker, followed by a red one and a blue one. He proceeds to draw an identity pyramid that is split down the middle: Left, Right, and the key features for each side. "I could never anticipate the degree to which I would be dragged into the news," he says me as he draws the first horizontal layer, which is the famous "Four Tribes speech" delivered by former President Reuven Rivlin, in which he warned against Israeli fragmentation. Another layer has Israel's elite Ashkenazi class alongside nationalism and the have-nots; and on top of that layer, there are the two types of democracies: the basic vs. the substantive.
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He explained that the Left, often called the elitist "First Israel" that has turned its back on its Jewish identity, has resolved to attack former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when he was in office "because attacking a powerful icon would undermine the other side of the pyramid, the Jewish side, and when Netanyahu falls, the entire Right falls."
Q: How long have you believed in this?
"When I went to Naftali Bennett and Ayelet Shaked (who head the Yamina party Chikli represents in the Knesset) before the new government was formed and before Operation Guardian of the Walls, I told them that toppling Netanyahu is not just about Netanyahu, whom we may disagree with, but a big event that we have to see in the larger context of Donald Trump's loss. I told them that Trump's departure was a major blow to the national-Jewish camp and that we have to see how this could impact the situation with Iran and the EU's motivation to influence President Joe Biden and his team and their drive to push various diplomatic initiatives.
"Another thing I told them was that if they want to be prime ministers for real, not just as the leaders of 6 seats, they must never insult their future voters, who are in the Jewish side of the pyramid. If they focus on the short term, the 30 seats that are hidden there will never go with them again."
Chikli's first Knesset bid was through the ill-fated New Right party, where he was placed 9th on its candidate list. But the party failed to pass the necessary Knesset threshold.
Just before the latest election, he joined Yamina, after being hastily summoned and being told he had to make a decision on the spot. "I felt better with the split from the Religious Zionist faction, the party seemed less elitist that way, even though I was not happy about how they (Yamina) were not willing to give me time to think about it," he said.
Throughout the interview, it is clear that the rough and tumble of political life is not his natural setting. He prefers deep thinking and long-term planning that is based on a practical application of subject matter. "I run marathons. I have come with the feeling that there is time, slowly but surely. I was the one who wrote Yamina's platform on the environment and I was the one who prepared Knesset queries on how to restore law and order in the Negev and fight foreign funding of NGOs in Israel. This week I was on the tip of the iceberg, there is no middle ground on this matter."
Q: You are the only MK who has the privilege of voting with your conscience rather than abide by party discipline. But it seems that you ultimately voted according to politics rather than ideology.
"I said I would vote for the Citizenship Bill (which is designed to combat the naturalization of Palestinians married to Israelis) in its original language. But over the course of the plenum debate, various compromises were reached, such as increasing the number of Palestinian naturalizations to 3,100 from 1,500, and that a humanitarian committee would examine further requests. It is clear that six months from now this matter will once again come up for a vote and more compromises will be announced. I know that Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked has the prerogative to decide on each case, but I am not sure Shaked would have enough time to deal with this matter."
Q: What about the no-confidence vote?
"That is what ultimately tilted the scales. I stood there and realized that I had to go back to the evening when the government was sworn in. I was asked to vote not on the merits of the bill but on whether I, through this vote, support in principle this government. This is my experience. The easy option was to be a no-show and the bill would have passed, to the chagrin of certain circles. A less easy option would have been to enter and abstain. But it is tenfold harder to vote no."
Q: You say it is hard to vote, but it seems that you have received a warm embrace by Likud and on social media.
"It's hard on other levels. I have not asked for this publicity and the social circles I am in do not vote for Yamina or for Likud, and this vote is very problematic. People who are not here do not know how fateful decisions on Israel's security are made, in the middle of the night. I did not receive a clear position, in writing, on the consequential things. They did not come and tell us that Meretz and Ra'am were against it and that there might not be enough votes, that it's best if I go to sleep for several hours to see if they could reach some understandings and vote at 11 a.m. What happened shows that Ra'am and Meretz have real leverage. The way things have been run is just not right."
Q: How is your vote preventing improper conduct?
"It sounds the alarm that there is a much bigger problem than improper conduct: Anytime something related to national values comes up for a vote, the government would have to rely on Ra'am and Meretz. In six months, we are going to get this played out all over again, and after the Citizenship Bill issue is resolved, there will be other bills on the table with similar aspects, or a military campaign in Gaza, and the issue of the Evyatar outpost will resurface. What emerged from that night of the vote is Ra'am's real power; it holds the balance of power. That is why I felt I could afford to lose this battle because the larger war is over the government and its composition, which is much more dangerous than this bill."
Q: What can you tell Yamina voters? You are after all committed to them and it's hard to believe that they would be in favor of passing that bill.
"The ultimate goal is to change the government's composition, that bigger war is more important, even if that means losing a battle."
Q: So, in the long run, this is how you plan to topple the government?
"It's hard to delineate exactly how this will unfold and that the best path to do so is. The vote is a test case, it is an issue of national importance but not a major one – the vote was not on war or some strike on Iran, or on an American statement, and we saw how the government had to give in on Zionist principles and water down the bill. It is not unthinkable that this conduct will repeat itself in future cases that would be of much greater national significance."
This was the first time that Chikli, 39, voted against the government. Although he is still technically part of Yamina, he appears very comfortable in his role as a member of the opposition.
Q: Yamina has threatened to trigger a mechanism that would make you a renegade defector.
"I don't think this would happen. And this doesn't scare me."
Q: So what would you do if this happens?
"This will be an opportunity to form a movement that would fill the vacuum on the Right, a movement championing liberal economics that would give people an ideological-intellectual anchor that stays fixed without following the latest fad. I think there must but a movement that is to the Right of Likud, like Meretz, but a polar opposite. A movement like this, once it is formed, would be able to run for the Knesset. Aside from that, I can always pre-empt any move to declare me a renegade by resigning and then launching a bid with Likud or some other party, and there is another option: that I would run and fail. That's perfectly fine by me."
Q: So a day after you announced that you were breaking with Bennett and Shaked, you were invited to the Prime Minister's Residence (Netanyahu was still prime minister). What did Likud promise you?
"There is nothing final with Likud. I went there several days after Bennett and Shaked announced that they would form the change government and I made sure that there would be nothing final in my meetings. It's also important to understand that I had been having a tough time in Yamina."
Chikli points to the event that took place toward the end of Operation Guardian of the Walls as the point of no return, in which a crisis of trust emerged between him and the rest of the party with which he had campaigned during the 2021 election. "During the operation, I was told that Yamina no longer saw a partnership with Yair Lapid and Mansour Abbas as being on the table, and I was instructed not to speak on the matter publicly. I was told not to take part in a conference organized by right-wing organizations on the terrorists in mixed cities. I was told by the party that the conference would have no media presence because it would not serve the goal of forming a new right-wing government that they were trying to form, now that they no longer sought a change government. I asked that the media do cover it and I got a favorable response from news outlets, but Bennett's spokesman said no."
Q: That sounds a bit naive on your part.
"Why?"
Q: Because you had been told that a right-wing government is about to be formed but you don't ask how? You don't inquire whether there are renegades among Gideon Sa'ar's party to make this happen? You don't try to add up the numbers to see if an actual government is about to be formed?
"At no point was I involved in the negotiations and I don't know what Bennett was telling Meretz and Ra'am as they were trying to form a government. Several days later I see that there is a meeting between (left-wing MKs) Yesh Atid leader Yair Lapid and Blue and White Chairman Benny Gantz. I felt that I had been conned. A crisis of trust was created that made it difficult for me to take any promises from the party chief seriously."
Q: Netanyahu is more trustworthy?
"When it comes to being committed to his voters, yes."
Q: You know that it was Netanyahu who made Abbas legitimate in the public discourse and that he would have given him the same funding that Bennett and Lapid gave him.
"I have been very critical of Netanyahu and the Likud over the years, and I have not deleted a single post I made online, but Yamina's conduct is critical because the question is the wholesale reneging on their promises, not whether they may have gotten something wrong. It's a question of what's left of the party's identity."
When I ask Chikli what he is offering voters on a practical level, he says: "I am not blind to the complexities of our political deadlock. It is Bennett's responsibility to deliver to voters what he campaigned on by partnering with Likud and hopefully he will be able to bring with him people like Benny Gantz."
Q: But the Likud does not want this.
"I hope some responsible adult with national right-wing views emerges and make sure that such a government would be formed without having to be at Ra'am's mercy as the party that holds the balance of power."
Q: Do you have the name of someone who could emerge?
"I would rather not name names."
Q: Do you still talk with Bennett?
"On a technical level."
Q: Do you think that after the vote on the Citizenship Bill he came home and told himself he had made a mistake?
"No. He has his own narrative."
Q: During the vote over the Citizenship Bill, Bennett could be seen wandering the Knesset plenum trying to scrape votes while Lapid, Yisrael Beytenu leader Avigdor Lieberman, and New Hope leader Sa'ar were sitting idly by.
"Yes, I saw this. During Operation Guardian of the Walls, there was an opportunity, and perhaps if we had said that we are in favor of the original language of the bill, a crack could have been formed and Sa'ar would have found a face-saving solution to his intransigence. The operation made us all reset our promises. Whenever there is a major event like that, it serves as a way to show flexibility. It's no coincidence that Bennett said that this operation had him rethink his course of action. But at that point during the vote, I was no longer relevant."
Q: Has Netanyahu congratulated you on the appointment of your new spokeswoman, Noy Bar, who is Avner's girlfriend?
"Of course note. The hiring process was actually the exact opposite of what's common. After I got the best resume, I asked myself what impact her boyfriend would have on me, and whether I have to think about what people would say. More than 65 resumes were submitted and only 20 made the cut. We met four of them, two of whom were the finalists who got tasks, and Noy reached the top. After she was tapped, I realized that some would say that 'I am a Netanyahu diehard' but she has great qualities. The anti-Netanyahu protesters have no sway on me."
Q: How many hours of sleep do you get?
"Usually five, but after that vote, I slept three hours, between 9 and 12."
Q: You once said that you would prefer to enter public life only after the kids had grown up.
"In terms of my family, the price is very difficult. Over the past week, I left my home on Sunday at 5 a.m. toward the Knesset and came back on Thursday afternoon. This week I managed to come back on Tuesday night, but that is not the norm. The job I have right now is like being the commander of a battalion, and when I am back home, I can think clearly. The ability to ignore texts on my iPhone is different. Until I entered politics, I had a rule that the iPhone would always stay in my car, but this is hardly what happens now. It is a very tough challenge, and what saves me is the Sabbath."
Q: Do you keep Shabbat?
"I go out my way not to use the cellphone on Shabbat and usually I manage to do so. But if I go traveling on Shabbat then I do use it to play music. I fall off the wagon sometimes, but this is the general rule."
Q: So you use the car on Shabbat but you don't look at screens? What's the rule?
"There is Kiddush, and Havdala and family trips, and I can go by car just to eat something, even if I go up to read from the Torah at synagogue that day."
Q: Doesn't that confuse the kids?
"No, they are Jewish. We are not affiliated with any stream. We are just what people might call observant."
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