Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Moshe Kahlon are set to meet this evening in an attempt to come to an agreement over the future of Israel’s new public broadcaster and end a weeks-long coalition crisis that has been threatening elections.
Netanyahu threatened earlier this month to call early elections if the coalition refuses to cancel reforms advanced by his own Likud party that would shutter the Israel Broadcasting Authority and launch the replacement broadcaster, called “Kan,” by April 30.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, right, with Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon during the weekly cabinet meeting at the Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem, February 19, 2017. (Olivier Fitoussi)
Kahlon opposes the closure of the new broadcaster, which has been in the works for two years — with hundreds of staff already hired — and whose closure at this late date would cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of shekels in wasted spending, according to Treasury officials.
Following the weekly cabinet meeting Sunday at the Prime Minister’s Office, Netanyahu and Kahlon sat down together, along with Interior Minister Aryeh Deri, who then left the two men to talk things through. They met again Sunday evening, but an agreement remained elusive.
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