Opposition filibusters through the night at acrimonious Knesset debate

An ill-tempered day in the Knesset on Monday turned into a fractious night as lawmakers bickered and filibustered for some 15 hours into the early hours of Tuesday morning.

Opposition MKs made clear their desire to paralyze the new government of Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and Foreign Minister Yair Lapid as debates dragged on through the night in the Knesset plenum.

Two motions of no-confidence in the government were knocked down. The first saw the Likud party’s claim that the public has low trust in the justice system rejected, with 61 MKs opposing the motion and 52 supporting.

That proposal prompted a sparring match between Justice Minister Gideon Sa’ar and his predecessor Likud MK Amir Ohana, who spearheaded the bill.

“Enough with the attitude already. You were justice minister in the transitional government, okay? Calm down, relax and drink a glass of water,” Sa’ar said.

Ohana, for his part, claimed that during his own time in office “at least the public felt there was someone who made their voices heard. A voice that did not come to destroy but to correct.”

A joint no-confidence motion by the ultra-Orthodox parties Shas and United Torah Judaism claiming that the new government was “a government of hatred” was also rejected, 61-52 with two abstentions.

Meanwhile, a number of bills were passed on their first reading, including an extension of the deadline for budget approval.

Additionally, legislation passed its first reading ensuring that the premiership rotation deal between Bennett and Lapid struck during coalition negotiations cannot be reneged on.

In the previous government, opposition leader and then-prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu refused to pass a state budget throughout 2020 — the only way to call elections without coalition partner Defense Minister Benny Gantz immediately becoming transitional prime minister — thus sinking their rotation deal.

Also passed in its first reading was an extension of the so-called Norwegian law, which allows any MK who is appointed to a cabinet post to step down temporarily from the Knesset, thereby permitting the next candidate on the party’s slate to enter parliament in their stead.

In a speech from the podium, Likud MK Yoav Kisch attacked Lapid, who is alternate prime minister as well as foreign minister, drawing attention to his previous rallying against bloated governments.

“You are a hypocrite, you are corrupt, you are a liar,” Kisch said to loud jeers from government members. “Those things you said against the Norwegian Law, you are now doing twice as much. You came out against the concept of ‘alternate prime minister,’ you called it a ‘deal between thieves.’ How do you have the audacity to sit in this chair?”

A bill was also passed in its first reading that allows a minimum of four lawmakers to break away from a faction, a proposal seemingly aimed at Netanyahu’s Likud and potential defectors to the coalition. Under the existing law, at least a third of a faction’s members must want to split for such a move to be permitted.

The Knesset also passed legislation connected to the pandemic, with a bill passing its first reading on unemployment payments, as well as extending legislation that permits prisoners to attend remand hearings remotely amid concerns of COVID-19 outbreaks within the prison system.

Additionally, the Knesset plenum approved the formation of the parliament’s Constitution, Law and Justice Committee, led by Labor MK Gilad Kariv, with 60 MKs supporting the motion and 52 opposing.

Kariv, the first Reform rabbi to serve in Knesset, has drawn intense criticism from ultra-Orthodox lawmakers in the opposition. Haredi leaders said they will boycott the new committee — a powerful panel tasked with redrafting and pushing through key legislation — and will not send representatives to it because of their hostility to Reform Judaism.

“We can’t be part of such an injustice,” said United Torah Judaism’s Uri Maklev. “The intended chairman represents the Reform movement, which is trying to destroy the Jewish people with malicious intent.”

The ultra-Orthodox parties have repeatedly vowed to shun Kariv, who was voted into parliament in March.

Earlier on Monday, the Knesset Arrangements Committee was also the scene of jarring arguments, with opposition lawmakers throwing insults at the committee chair during a meeting on extending the so-called “family reunification” law barring the path to automatic citizenship for Palestinians.

When MK Idit Silman of the Yamina party, who also serves as coalition whip, tried to convene the meeting, she was shot down by Likud faction chair MK Miki Zohar, who had entered late and demanded to be updated on what he had missed.

Told by Silman to ask his colleagues sitting next to him rather than interrupt the entire debate, Zohar said, “Who are you anyway? Answer like a good girl.”

“I won’t answer you ‘like a good girl,’” Silman shot back. “You came late… you come late and yet you disrupt the committee. You should be ashamed, Miki Zohar.”

Later on during the meeting, Zohar apologized to Silman for his comment, saying it came “in the heat of the moment.”