Likud breaks silence, calls anti-Netanyahu bloc ‘anti-democratic’

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party makes its first statement since election night, calling a potential anti-Netanyahu bloc aiming to disqualify him as premier “anti-democratic.”

Parties that have vowed not to join a Netanyahu government, plus the Islamist Ra’am, together hold a 61-strong Knesset majority that could pass a law barring criminal defendants from forming a government, attempting to oust Netanyahu.

MK Avigdor Liberman has publicly supported such a move, saying in a statement that he’ll do “everything” to prevent fifth elections, and the “first” step in that would be passing such a law. He calls on all “sides hoping for a change” will support it.

“But Likud, in its statement, says: “A ‘bloc of change’ is a whitewashed term for an anti-democratic bloc. The only change they really want is to bring laws existing only in Iran to rule out candidates and cancel the choice of over a million citizens.”