Last Wednesday, the Likud’s lawmakers voted to replace MK Yuli Edelstein with MK Boaz Bismuth as chairperson of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee. Initially, the balloting of the two Likud MKs was supposed to be secret; however, Likud’s legal adviser overturned the decision, saying that anything other than an open vote was “inconsistent with the law.”
The decision not to have secret balloting in effect discouraged disobedient MKs from voting against the move (i.e., against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s wishes), even though four MKs – Edelstein, Eli Dalal, Shalom Danino, and David Bitan – did not support Edelstein’s ouster. Twenty-nine Likud MKs voted in favor.
The vote is problematic from political, democratic, and ideological perspectives. Netanyahu and his supporters wanted Edelstein removed from the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee because he has prevented the passage of a law, paradoxically referred to as a law to enlist haredim for military service – even though it is actually designed to exempt haredi youths from such service.
The issue of military service
The haredi parties have taken preliminary steps to leave the coalition if such a law is not passed, though at the moment they apparently do not intend to bring down the government and set early elections in motion. They are also opposed to various financial and administrative sanctions being applied to 18 to 26-year-old haredim who are shirking military service, which is something Edelstein has insisted on.
Certainly, Likud MKs and Netanyahu are ideologically committed to all Israeli Jews serving in the IDF, with few exceptions. Therefore, the sole motivation for Edelstein’s ouster is clearly political. The objective is to ensure that the current government preserves its Knesset majority, which it attained in the November 2022 elections to the 25th Knesset, even though all current public opinion polls indicate that if elections were held today, the government would lose its majority.
According to the same opinion polls, a clear majority of the general population favors enlistment of the haredim. This is not only because of the principle of equality, but also because the IDF is short of at least 10,000 new recruits. It is seriously overstretched, as reservists are repeatedly being called up for military service.
Edelstein is a serious and experienced politician
Though Edelstein's record of upholding the rule of law is far from perfect, the former Soviet refusenik nevertheless has a reputation for being a serious and experienced politician. In addition, he is much more knowledgeable than Bismuth concerning the responsibilities of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, and therefore more suitable to head it. Bismuth is viewed as a lightweight by many, and even as something of a clown, though he is not one of the worst Likud MKs.
Edelstein’s constitutional foible occurred at the end of March 2020. As temporary speaker of the 23rd Knesset, in a rather unstable and confused political situation accompanied by the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, he refused to abide by a ruling of the High Court of Justice that he immediately hold a vote in the Knesset to elect a new Speaker to replace him.
This was the first time a Likudnik in a high political position refused to abide by a ruling of the High Court of Justice. Today, this appears to be a regular Likud state of mind, which constantly threatens to create a constitutional crisis.
The crisis finally ended with Edelstein’s resignation and the election of MK Benny Gantz (Blue and White) as speaker. When Gantz joined a national unity government with Netanyahu 53 days later, he was replaced by MK Yariv Levin (Likud).
Bismuth was finally elected by the Likud to replace Edelstein as chairperson of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee because the haredi parties preferred him. They believe he is most likely to deliver the law they want – and not because Netanyahu preferred him to any of the other candidates, and not because the Likud really believes that Bismuth is suitable to head this committee.
(The Knesset House Committee and the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee must still approve Bismuth’s appointment.)
Sectarian interests are setting the agenda
The fact that the haredi parties, and the elderly rabbis who determine their policy goals, are in a position to cause a totally unsuitable candidate to be selected to head the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee shows just how low our political system has stooped. The haredi demand was not based on an understanding of Israel’s foreign affairs and security concerns and interests, but rather on purely sectarian interests of the haredi community.
In the past, those who chaired the committee – from whichever political party – were respectable figures, with relevant experience. For example, MK Yuval Steinitz (Likud), who was the chairperson from 2003-2006, initiated serious reports and reforms in the committee, in cooperation with MKs from numerous coalition and opposition parties.
This was also the period when MK Michael Eitan (Likud), as chairperson of the Knesset Constitution, Law, and Justice Committee, initiated an effort to prepare a constitution by broad agreement, in which several Arab and haredi MKs were also involved. Today, this committee, headed by Simcha Rothman (Religious Zionist Party), is committed to breaking down our legal and judicial systems, rather than reforming them.
It is not an exaggeration to say that in the final reckoning, if Netanyahu had insisted on decisions being taken more on the basis of national interests and less on the basis of his own political survival interests, much of what I have described would have been avoided.
However, what can be expected of a man who said on a recent podcast that he deserves credit for the entries of Burger King and McDonald’s into the Israeli market – even though they both set up franchises here in 1993, during Yitzhak Rabin’s term as prime minister?
The writer has written journalistic and academic articles, as well as several books, on international relations, Zionism, Israeli politics, and parliamentarism. Between 1994-2010, she worked at the Knesset Library and the Knesset Research and Information Center.