I do not know why this is the case. Why, in our political culture, does this investigation have to hinder Herzog in an attempt to join the government?
Aryeh Deri is also being investigated, for what is supposedly a more serious issue, and he and his party (Shas) are fine sitting in the government, and the coalition heads are also fine with them remaining in the government despite the investigation.
So, why should this be a problem for Labor if it isn't for Shas and Likud (and other coalition members that might have a say)?
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There is a difference between לכתחילה and בדיעבד
ReplyDeleteWhen it comes to personal conduct everything is about political opportunism. The Knesset ban for moral ineptitude is based on how long they wanted to keep Deri out of politics. Lieberman was investigated for 10 years before having his name cleared. Those investigations always picked up steam around election time. Lapid jumped into politics earlier than intended because the Knesset was in the process of passing a law to lock him out of the Knesset. Not to mention the Yisrol HaYom law targeting an individual newspaper because of fear that it was creating political capital.
ReplyDeleteShas waiting 7 years for Deri to come back and lead them. If going to jail wasn't enough to take away from his political support a little scandal isn't going to do it. Bibi isn't going to risk losing is own Government over what for the time being is an internal Shas matter.
Bibi has proven to be a master at playing the politics game in order to keep his job in the PM chair. He changed the laws of floor crossing in order to keep Barak as his Defence Minister destroying the Labor Party in the process. He changed Likud's internal mechanisms to block Moshe Feiglin as a potential serious challenger to his job. He would be stupid not to be working on ways to stabilize the coalition, especially as certain coalition members have a tendency to threaten to quit on a regular basis.
While Herzog is in a scandal would not be the most politically opportune time to bring Labor into the Government. If elections are called before the scandal works itself out, Bibi can't use the scandal to attack Herzog if he joined the Government now. For the time being Bibi can wait to see how the scandal plays out. If things blow over, the door to negotiations reopen. If they don't then Tzipi Livni becomes Opposition Leader. The dynamics would need to be reevaluated once again.
Saying they were close to coming to a deal sounds like they were about to sign and then changed there minds when the scandal broke. It can also mean that they were close the same way Fatah and Hamas are close to signing a coalition agreement.