Likud says Yamina no longer part of Netanyahu bloc

Strained coalition talks between the right-wing Yamina party and Likud have broken down, and the six-seat faction appears headed to the opposition, Likud says.

“Last night it became clear at long last that Yamina decided to resign from the right-wing bloc,” the Likud party charges in a statement.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had called Yamina leader Naftali Bennett on Monday evening to offer the small six-seat party the ministries of education and Jerusalem, a “significant” deputy ministership responsible for national service volunteering and the Settlement Division overseeing development in West Bank settlements.

Bennett, in turn, demanded the health and transportation ministries, and the chairmanship of the Knesset’s powerful Law, Constitution and Justice Committee.

Bennett’s demands “have no connection to his party’s electoral size, or to the priorities of religious Zionism,” Likud charges, and accuses Yamina of “demanding four senior [cabinet] portfolios that have no connection to religious Zionism.”