PM ‘very pleased’ with Likud primary results, launches fresh attack on Gantz

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says he is “very, very pleased” with the results of the Likud primaries, which has yielded a list of “strong and impressive” candidates.

In a video uploaded to social media, Netanyahu also praises Likud members for “voting according to my recommendations.”

Netanyahu views former cabinet minister Gideon Sa’ar as a potential replacement and had lobbied party members hard to push him down the list. Sa’ar finished fourth behind Netanyahu.

In his statement, Netanyahu also hits out at Israel Resilience party leader Benny Gantz for raising the possibility of an Israeli pullback from the West Bank.

“The real trouble is that [Palestinian Authority President] Abbas is also pleased, because today Gantz said he would carry out a second disengagement from the West Bank, and Abbas just wished him luck in the elections,” Netanyahu says.

“We have to stop this together… the reality of the elections is this: it’s either a left-wing government under Gantz, or a Likud government under my leadership.”

Earlier, Gantz told the Yedioth Ahronoth daily that Israel’s 2005 withdrawal from the Gaza Strip had been “approved by the Israeli government and implemented by the army and settlers in a painful but good way.”

“(One should) learn from it and apply it to other places,” the ex- IDF chief said.

Gantz did not explicitly mention the West Bank in his remarks and refrained from outlining conditions for any pullback from the territory.

Afterwards, Abbas’s spokesman cautiously welcomed Gantz’s “encouraging” remarks.