Bennett to skip security cabinet meeting, will visit Gaza border instead

Lame duck Education Minister Naftali Bennett is not attending the security cabinet meeting currently taking place in Tel Aviv, choosing instead to visit residence in the Gaza border region affected by the sharp escalation in rocket attacks from the Strip.

The meeting, the first of the high-level forum responsible for authorizing military operations since the latest round of violence began on Friday, started at 3 p.m. after being postponed from 12.30 earlier in the afternoon.

While Bennett’s visit to Israel’s south appears to have been a last minute undertaking, (it’s not featured on his public schedule) it’s unclear if the New Right leader, whose party failed to enter the Knesset in last month’s election, had initially intended to attend the meeting.

A spokesperson for Bennett, a long-time critic of both the weak role given to the security cabinet and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Gaza policy, would not comment what the minister intends to say during a series of press interviews he will give while on the Gaza border.

New Right No.2 Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked, who was also voted out of the Knesset along with Bennett, will attend the meeting being held at the Defense Ministry headquarters in Tel Aviv.

Both Bennett and Shaked will remain ministers in the transitional government until the new government is sworn in once a coalition has been formed.

— Raoul Wootliff