Ben Gvir says Likud, Shas forged deal with Arab parties to keep him out of war cabinet

Far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir accuses Likud and Shas of reaching a deal with the Arab parties in a bid to block him from entering the top level war cabinet.

According to Ben Gvir’s Otzma Yehudit party, it had conditioned its support for today’s vote on funding for religious councils on Ben Gvir being granted a seat at the top-level council, even though Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu disbanded the war cabinet several weeks ago when MK Benny Gantz’s party left the government.

However, to foil the far-right leader, Netanyahu’s Likud and Aryeh Deri’s Shas reportedly secured the necessary support for the bill from the Arab parties.

“This deal between Likud, Deri and the terror supporters, in order to prevent the entry of Ben Gvir into the limited cabinet, is an embarrassment,” Otzma Yehudit says in a statement.

“We call on all the right-wing Likud members not to support this deal.”

The funding bill, written by MK Erez Malul, drew sharp criticism from some watchdog groups due to concerns that it could serve as a backdoor for reintroducing some of the provisions of the failed Rabbis Bill recently promoted by his ultra-Orthodox Shas party — a claim that Malul and other backers of the legislation denied.

The new bill would amend the Religious Services Law, which regulates how much the government and municipalities contribute respectively to the budgets of the bodies providing religious services to communities at the city and regional council levels.