Yamina MK vows to vote for budget, rejecting pressure to jump ship to opposition

As final debates on approving a state budget took place Tuesday in the Knesset, a Yamina lawmaker who was seen as a potential threat to the coalition said he will vote in favor of the legislation.

“I reassure you, I will vote in favor of the budget,” Yomtob Kalfon said in an interview with Channel 12. “The budget is good for the people of Israel, good for religious Zionists.”

“They’re approaching me for ideological reasons, it’s no secret,” Kalfon said of opposition lawmakers who are trying to torpedo the budget proceedings to bring down the government.

“I got a lot of offers. Aside from the premiership, they offered me everything. It seems they approached other coalition members, they’re trying everything, but as far as I can tell, it’s not going to work,” Kalfon said. “The budget will pass, and the opposition will stay there for many years.”

The diverse composition of the government led by Prime Minister Naftali Bennett — made up of right-wing, centrist and left-wing parties — is complicating the effort to pass a budget, with the opposition of a single lawmaker theoretically able to bring down the wafer-thin coalition.

Lawmaker Amichai Chikli, also a member of Bennett’s Yamina party, said Saturday that he would not vote with the coalition in favor of the budget. Chikli also voted against the establishment of the coalition in June. Without his vote, the coalition numbers 61 in the 120-seat Knesset.

“I do not do the mathematics of self-interest, and there is no deal by which I will support the budget,” Chikli told Channel 12. He also said that his party had not tried to discuss the budget with him, and has not attempted to gain his support.

Chikli claimed, with no evidence, that the money set aside in the budget for projects in the Arab community would instead be used for “radicalization.”

Right-wing lawmakers in the coalition have been targeted because they are ideologically closer to the opposition, which is led by former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing Likud party, and have had disagreements with the government’s left-wing and Arab lawmakers.

Thousands of right-wing protesters rallied in Tel Aviv on Tuesday night against the government and the effort to pass the budget.

Marathon debates on approving a state budget began Tuesday in the Knesset and were expected to continue through the night and the following day as the government aimed to break a 3.5-year spell during which no national budget was passed.

It marked the first time that a government has presented a state budget for final approval in parliament since 2018, due to a prolonged political deadlock that saw successive governments fall before they could bring a plan to the Knesset.

Proceedings began with a message from Knesset Finance Committee chairman Alex Kushnir, who was followed by Finance Minister Avigdor Liberman.

In the hours to come, each lawmaker will have a chance to speak for 30 minutes, a process expected to continue at least until Wednesday night.

After that, senior cabinet members will address the Knesset, with Bennett set to speak at 7 p.m. Wednesday.

Voting on the budget will begin late Wednesday. A final vote on the budget is not expected to be held until Thursday night or Friday morning. The prolonged voting process is due to hundreds of preliminary votes on specific objections lawmakers can raise on the budget and the accompanying Arrangements Bill, which contains the details of how the financial plan will be put into practice.

The government has until November 14 to pass the budget. Failure to do so will automatically trigger fresh elections, which would be Israel’s fifth in three years.

The last time an Israeli government managed to pass a budget was in March 2018. Failure to approve the budget was what brought down the previous government late last year.

The budget bill for 2021 passed its first reading in September by a 59-54 vote, with the 2022 budget getting the go-ahead with a vote of 59 to 53.

Heading to a United Nations climate summit in Glasgow on Sunday, Bennett said he was confident the budget would pass despite “desperate” attempts by the opposition to prevent its passage and effectively topple the government.