Financial Times: Netanyahu forms the most right-wing government in Israel’s history
The Financial Times published a report by James Shooter entitled “Netanyahu forms the most right-wing government in Israel’s history”.
Barely 18 months after being removed from his post as prime minister, facing corruption charges and alienating his former allies.
Benjamin Netanyahu is preparing to return to power at the helm of the most right-wing government in Israel’s history.
After an unexpectedly big victory in last month’s elections, the Likud party struck temporary agreements with all five far-right groups that Netanyahu, 73, hopes to form a government with.
On Thursday night, Netanyahu asked the Israeli president to give him two more weeks to finish the process.
He added, “Supporters see it as a once-in-a-generation opportunity to remake Israel in its ultra-conservative religious image.
But anti-Arab and homophobic rhetoric, along with plans to dismantle judicial checks and balances, has sparked a backlash from liberal opponents and growing anxiety among Israel’s allies.
“This election really marks a turning point,” Dalia Scheindlin, a political analyst and pollster”.
It is a major break from the past in terms of the extent of their extremism, the extent of their explicit commitment to undermining democratic institutions and their efforts to annex the occupied West Bank,” she added.
The Financial Times report says, “A large part of the uproar surrounding the new government centers on two ultra-nationalists with a history of provocative anti-Arab rhetoric, namely Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich”.
Ben Gvir was previously convicted of incitement to racism, and until two years ago he kept in his home a picture of a Jewish extremist who shot 29 Palestinians dead in a mosque.
He will be Minister of National Security, with expanded powers and responsibilities for the Israel Police.
He adds that Smotrich, a self-described proud homophobic settler leader, said last year that Israel’s first leader, David Ben-Gurion, made a mistake by not expelling all the Arabs in 1948.
He was seeking the defense minister and instead was appointed minister of finance.
The Palestinian officials fear that the appointment of the two men, who oppose the establishment of a Palestinian state and support the expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank – considered illegal by most of the international community – will lead to the disappearance of any lingering possibility of a two-state solution.
Financial Times report concluded, that protests have recently erupted over Netanyahu’s decision to make Avi Maoz, the ultra-nationalist known for his staunch opposition to the rights of the LGBT community, head of a body that promotes Jewish identity, and to give him powers over some activities in schools.
