Deri: Shas won’t support prime ministerial rotation deal

Shas chairman Aryeh Deri has vowed not to support any rotation deal after the upcoming election and said that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu could desert the ultra-Orthodox parties if they were not strong enough.

Speaking to a small group of party activists at an events hall, and via video conference, Deri also denounced recent decisions by the High Court of Justice on matters of religion and state and said that the choice at the elections was between a right-wing, ultra-Orthodox government, and turning Israel into a state similar to non-Jewish countries.

Deri’s comments come following a sharp exchange between himself and Moshe Gafni, chairman of the United Torah Judaism party, who recently accused Shas of being a racist party, following comments by a Shas MK that UTJ is racist.

“It is clear today that there are two options for the day after the elections as to who will form a government,” Deri said on Thursday night.

“Either it is Netanyahu with the ultra-Orthodox, a Jewish government, a government that protects the Jewishness of the state, protects Shabbat, protects tradition, protects the Torah world and Jewish education and conversion in accordance with Jewish law, or it is Yair Lapid.

“It’s either Netanyahu or Lapid,” continued Deri saying that although the Yesh Atid leader had ceased his attacks against the ultra-Orthodox parties, he still held positions against those of the ultra-Orthodox community.

The Shas leader also addressed the political stalemate currently forecast by the opinion polls, in which the likelihood of any political bloc gaining a workable majority again appears slim. He said that despite this reality, Shas would not support a prime ministerial rotation deal to form a new government.

“I promise, in light of the experience of the last year, there won’t be rotation or mutation. We’re done with this thing,” quipped Deri.

“Netanyahu can serve for four full years as prime minister,” he continued, but also warned of the premier’s political loyalty.

“Politics is cruel, if Shas won’t be strong enough, a government will be formed without Shas and there won’t be a Jewish state here which protects tradition.”

Earlier on Thursday, Deri strongly criticized Gafni for his comment that Shas was racist, saying that the latter was worried about losing votes to the Religious Zionist Party, which has electoral appeal in parts of the ultra-Orthodox community, and that the UTJ leader “wants to take votes from the Sephardim.”

According to a report on Walla News on Wednesday, Gafni fumed at Shas MK Moshe Arbel for giving an interview last week in which he criticized Ashkenazi ultra-Orthodox schools affiliated with UTJ who bar Sephardi girls, and said that racism was prevalent throughout ultra-Orthodox society.

Arbel also said he would not boycott Labor electoral candidate and Reform leader Gilad Kariv if Kariv is elected to the Knesset.

“Instead of dealing with the Reform and the problems they are causing, he says that the ultra-Orthodox are racists when he himself is in a racist party. Nobody there is Ashkenazi, everyone is Sephardi,” stormed Gafni.

Arbel responded and said that “it is sad that instead of halting the erosion of voters from UTJ and getting back the tens of thousands of voters from the Jerusalem Faction [a breakaway Ashkenazi group] Gafni has chosen to attack the most stable movement in the political system, the Shas movement.”