Lapid pleads for coalition to stay united, as Netanyahu vows to topple it

(Times of Israel, Oct 4, 2021)

Liberman warns that if the ultra-Orthodox parties join the government, his Yisrael Beytenu party will quit

Foreign Minister Yair Lapid told a meeting of his Yesh Atid faction on Monday that the members of the government coalition must stay unified ahead of the deadline to pass the state budget.

Speaking on the first day of the Knesset’s winter session, Lapid said that coalition lawmakers must focus on the bigger picture.

“We have five weeks, during which we all have one goal and one goal only: to pass a budget,” said Lapid. “Without that, there will be no government. Without that, nobody will accomplish their dreams. Instead we’ll go back to the chaos and the poison that was here just a few months ago.”

If the much-delayed budget does not pass by the November 14 deadline, the Knesset will automatically dissolve and a new election — Israel’s fifth in three years — would be called. The budget passed its first reading in September, but must pass its second and third readings in the plenum to become law.

Lapid said on Monday that lawmakers must avoid “being pulled in different directions,” and instead focus on the job of “passing a budget for what is important to all citizens of Israel: security, education, health, dealing with COVID-19, dealing with the elderly and improving the situation in the Arab community.”