Coalition to advance bill preventing PM’s Likud rivals from forming government

Coalition heads agree to advance a bill that would limit the powers of the president in deciding who to task with forming a government after elections, a proposal seen as an attempt to prevent a potential coup within the ruling Likud party against its leader, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The heads of coalition parties have come to an agreement in their weekly meeting to support the bill in its preliminary Knesset reading, allowing further discussions to be held on the government’s position, according to a Likud party spokesperson.

The bill, which comes in the form of an amendment to a quasi-constitutional law, would ensure that only the leader of each elected political party has the right to form a government and not any other figure on the parties’ lists.

The bill was proposed by coalition chair David Amsalem (Likud) due to claims that President Reuven Rivlin was looking at the possibility of asking Gideon Sa’ar, a potential challenger to Netanyahu in the next elections, to form a government.

Netanyahu had told Likud ministers earlier Sunday that there were “loopholes in the current law that needed to be fixed.”

— Raoul Wootliff