A playback of this week's webinar, 'Diaspora Jews & Israel’s judicial overhaul: Differing stances,' explores whether global Jewry should play a role in Israel's current crisis
Raoul Wootliff is the The Times of Israel s political correspondent.
Knesset members shout at each other after a bill that might have staved off elections is defeated, December 21, 2020 (Knesset channel screenshot)
The Knesset overnight Monday-Tuesday narrowly rejected a bill that would have deferred a Tuesday midnight deadline for passing the 2020 state budget, and thus set Israel on an almost certain course to its fourth general election in two years.
Barring a highly improbable rapprochement between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Blue and White Defense Minister Benny Gantz, enabling all three readings of the 2020 budget to pass into law Tuesday, the Knesset will automatically dissolve at midnight on Tuesday, and Israelis will go to the polls again, probably on March 23, 2021.
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Illustrative: Members of the Knesset s Constitution, Law and Justice Committee vote on the Coronavirus Bill on July 22, 2020. (Knesset)
New elections appeared almost inevitable Monday evening after the coalition’s Likud and Blue and White parties both said that their negotiations on delaying the deadline to pass a state budget had broken down and blamed each other for the failure to reach an agreement.
Blue and White has walked back all the agreements it reached with Likud, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s party said in a statement after Gantz appeared to increase his demands just hours after a bill to delay the budget passed its first Knesset committee reading.