Israel: Labor Votes To Join Netanyahu Coalition

[ Middle East News Service Comments: The essence of the story below is covered in the serious Australian media. Reading the headline is almost enough. But the reverberations from the Labour Party’s decision to join Binyamin Netanyahu’s coalition will continue over the next few days. Mazal Mualem in her article below already allows for the defection of some of the more extreme elements from the coalition in calculating a coalition of 66. Netanyahu already had 65 beforehand. But the right-wing incoming Prime Minister was not concerned so much with the numbers as in gaining a fig leaf to cover his right-wing policies. In a commentary on the subject Mualem suggests that the “outstanding achievement of the deal itself is within the social-economic field, and was pushed for by Histadrut Labor Federation leader Ofer Eini. It is a sort of economic rescue plan…The question is, would Eini as Histadrut chairman against Netanyahu as prime minister have been able to reach such achievements on his own? This is open for debate.”

But as she points out “what is remarkable is the lack of vision and achievement in the diplomatic sphere, the key area traditionally promoted by the Labor party.”

The best analysis so far has been provided by one of Israel’s most respected journalists, Channel 10’s Raviv Drucker [Heb]. This is taken from his blog but the sarcastic tone is probably appropriate. I have translated just his comments on the non-economic issues:

“What do you know, the Labour negotiations performers, the lovely pair of [Agriculture Minister Shalom] Simhon and Eini went in the morning and came out at night with unprecedented ‘dramatic achievements’….

“Let’s look at the facts

“First dramatic achievement – enforcement of the law in the matter of removal of the outposts. Don’t pinch yourself. It is enough to tell you, that when this demand was brought up, Likud’s Gideon Sa’ar said that he was willing to accept the Netanyahu government removing the same number of outposts as were removed by Defence Minister Barak in the Olmert Government.

“Second dramatic achievement – the government will strive to achieve regional peace. God help us. What claptrap. How would it strive? Would it be willing to give up the Golan Heights? Don’t be difficult. It will strive, that’s dramatic enough, isn’t it?

“Third dramatic achievement – the government will respect previous agreements. Wow! Netanyahu really folded here, surrendered, for the general rule is for Israeli governments to toss away previous agreements into the bin. Don’t you remember how the Shamir government tossed the peace agreement with Egypt into the bin? Or how the Netanyahu government burnt the Oslo agreement into cinders? No? Simhon apparently does remember.”

No doubt there will be more to come – Sol Salbe.].

Last update - 22:41 24/03/2009

Labor votes in favor of joining Netanyahu coalition

By Mazal Mualem, Haaretz Correspondent

The Labor Party Central Committee voted on Tuesday in favor of joining Prime Minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu's coalition, despite vocal opposition from within the party.

Netanyahu reached the preliminary agreement with Barak early Tuesday. Labor Party activists gathered later in the afternoon to vote on the deal, which calls on the government to pursue peace negotiations with the Palestinians.

Labor Chairman and Defense Minister Ehud Barak drafted the deal with Netanyahu. But half of the party's lawmakers objected to teaming up with Netanyahu because of his long-standing opposition to peace efforts.

680 of the central committee members voted in favor of joining the coalition, while 570 voted against. The voter turnout stood at 78 percent of the committee members.

"I'm happy that party delegates have decided to enter the government," Ofer Eini, head of the Histadrut labor union and a senior Labor Party operative, told Israel's Army Radio.

But others chanted slogans like "Disgrace" following the announcement

Labor's 13 seats in the parliament would give Netanyahu a majority of 66 in the 120-seat house. But there is a possibility that the party could split as a result of the vote, and some members might choose to remain in the opposition.

"I think that in terms of principles it will be hard for us to work together, and I assume the government and Benjamin Netanyahu aren't deluding themselves that they're going to get our support," lawmaker Amir Peretz, who opposed joining the government, told Channel 1 after the vote.

Ahead of the vote, Barak took the stand and in an impassioned speech said "we are responsible for the Labor Party, but we also have a responsibility to the state of Israel, to peace, to security. We don't have a back-up country, Yitzhak Rabin said that, and it is still true."

"Labor voters want to see us in the government, they want to see us there because we don't have a spare country," Barak added.

Addressing the opposition among some of his fellow party members to his move to join the coalition, and consequent criticism of him and his supporters, the Labor chairman went on to say that "there is no one here that is doing nothing more than holding on to a chair, and there's also no one here who epitomizes nothing but pure ideology - we're all friends. I reject with all my might the unfair and ludicrous attacks against [Labor MK] Shalom Simhon, against [Labor MK] Benjamin Ben-Eliezer and against me... Anyone who thinks that it is wiser to build the Labor Party as a fifth wheel in the opposition and not as a counter-force to the right-wing elements in the government doesn't know what he's talking about."

"I am not afraid of Benjamin Netanyahu. I won't serve as a fig leaf to anyone, and I won't be anyone's dead weight. We will be the counter-force that will prevent the formation of a narrow right-wing government, and ensure the establishment of a real government that will take care of the Israeli people," Barak continued.

The Labor leader rejected claims that he was motivated by selfish interests, saying that his only priority is the welfare of the country. "I am not chasing after any position," he said, "and I've manned almost all the positions, I was prime minister, defense minister, chief of staff, GOC and commander of the elite forces unit Sayeret Matkal. I don't need any more positions. Anyone who thinks that I am concerned with personal survival, I urge him to listen to the criticism hurled at us and understand the price one pays when going against the grain, against the trend, toward what is truly right for Israel."

Faction whip Eitan Cabel, one of the vocal opposition to Barak's move, warned that the party was losing its way. "What killed us over the last decade is the fact that we lost faith in our path."

"We have turned into the [far right-wing party] National Union of the secular sector. We always affect change from within, and slowly we are dying," Cabel continued, adding that "those who support the coalition deal with Likud are looking to crush their home."

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