Amid crisis, Bennett says he ‘understands’ renegade MK, government working fine

Interviews with Prime Minister Naftali Bennett are being broadcast on all three main newscasts in Israel.

Such media blitzes are usually only done for holidays, ahead of elections, or if the government is in crisis mode, and Bennett easily admits to the latter.

“I want to tell the public that the government is stable, is working,” he tells Channel 13, threatening that if his government falls, the country could see another four elections in a row.

Pressed on his coalition’s inability to pass legislation, he instead focuses on what he says are his government’s achievements, including what he says are efforts to bring down rising prices, which he blames on past governments, including those he was a member of.

He tells the channel that his government continues to operate without a majority, but admits that the defection of Yamina MK Idit Silman “has hurt us in no small way.”

He says he is not angry at Silman, but “understands her,” and claims that figures sent by Likud and by Religious Zionism harassed Silman’s children and their teachers for nine months, as well as those of Yamina MK Nir Orbach, though his own family was spared the same.

“It’s inhumane,” he says, in comments that appear aimed at not burning bridges with the renegade MKs.

“Her heart is in the right place,” he maintains.