After brouhaha, Regev sorry — that more of her comments were not leaked

Likud MK Miri Regev has offered a not-quite-apology for the lack of comprehensiveness in a recording that leaked of her saying that the party should prioritize bringing down the government over supporting soldiers or victims of rape.

“I apologize on behalf of whoever leaked half of my comments,” she tells Channel 12 after refusing to apologize throughout the day. “I said then that [the coalition] needs our vote to pass sensitive laws, and we need to put a price tag on that.”

MK Miri Regev speaks in the Knesset in Jerusalem, on February 7, 2022. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

“We need to decide if we are bringing down this coalition or keeping it on life support. It can’t pass any Zionist law without us,” she adds.

Regev had claimed throughout the day that only the mystery leaker “who took my words out of context” should need to apologize. Her comments about the party’s priorities were made amid an internal Likud battle over whether to support a coalition bill that would increase scholarship money for soldiers, an issue most Israelis support.

Channel 13 reports it got its hands on a full recording of Regev’s comments, during which she spoke for some eight minutes, mostly complaining about the fact that the party did not predict the backlash from its refusal to support the bill and pushing for Likud to stick to its guns on not supporting anything from the coalition short of a war declaration.

The fuller recording does not significantly change the meaning of her earlier-reported comments.