From the Liveblog of
Tuesday, March 12, 2024
Gideon Sa’ar announces breakup of National Unity alliance with Gantz, demands seat on war cabinet
Sam Sokol is the Times of Israel's political correspondent. He was previously a reporter for the Jerusalem Post, Jewish Telegraphic Agency and Haaretz. He is the author of "Putin’s Hybrid War and the Jews"
Demanding to join Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s war cabinet, Gideon Sa’ar announces the breakup of the National Unity party, dissolving the alliance with Minister Benny Gantz that began in July 2022.
Speaking at a party gathering in Tel Aviv, the former senior Likud member who leads the New Hope party says that while he has “respect for my colleagues, who represent the National Unity party in the war cabinet…unfortunately, they do not convey the voice, positions and emphasis that I would bring there,” the Haaretz daily reports.
“Therefore, on your behalf, I express our demand to join the security cabinet and participate in shaping policy,” Sa’ar says. “Our voice, the voice of the dignified right, is more essential today than ever. Israel today needs an alternative to the dignified right. If we don’t lead this — I don’t see anyone else who can do it.”
“Therefore, I have come to a decision: after consultation and on the opinion of my friends to end the partnership with [Gantz’s] Blue and White party and immediately re-establish the New Hope faction — the statesmanlike right in the Knesset as an independent faction, which will clearly express our national and civil worldview.”
In response, Gantz simply tweets: “Thank you and good luck.”
In an interview with the Knesset Channel last month, Sa’ar indicated that he no longer believed that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should be shunned.
Sa’ar, a former Likud minister, was pushed out of Likud after challenging Netanyahu for the leadership of the party several years ago.
National Unity, under Gantz, joined Netanyahu’s coalition as an emergency measure at the start of the war.
Before that, the party had refused to sit in a coalition with Netanyahu, who is on trial in three corruption cases and was accused of trying to undermine Israel’s democracy with his far-right government’s judicial overhaul that has since been suspended.
Sa’ar’s move does not reduce the size of the Netanyahu-led emergency coalition, which still has the support of 76 of the 120 Knesset members.
