PM Olmert and Liebermann, confused moves for defence and peace
The inclusion of the Israel Betanu party creates problems in the ruling coalition and also in the relationship with Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Liebermann is known as a "racist". The only positive point: Israel Betenu is a secular party that (perhaps) will fight for civil marriage, as yet non-existent in Israel.
Tel Aviv (AsiaNews) - Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, leader of the centre-right "Kadima" party, has decided to include in his coalition government the party of the extreme right, "Israel Betenu" (Israel Our House). The party's leader, Avigdor Liebermann, is to be appointed deputy prime minister and "minister for (dealing with) strategic threats". The parliamentary leader of the centre-left opposition party "Meretz", Ms. Zehavah Gal'on, has, in response, commented publicly that it is Mr. Liebermann himself who is "the strategic threat to Israeli democracy." The larger centre-left party, Labour, is to decide soon whether to remain in the coalition government once Mr. Liebermann and his party have joined it. While many in Labour oppose the inclusion of the extreme right in the government, it is widely foreseen that the Labour Party will nonetheless stay in the coalition. Labour's leader, Amir Peretz, is currently the Defence Minister.
Mr. Liebermann is himself a settler in the occupied West Bank, and is known as a harsh critic of the Arab national minority in Israel. He opposes the integration of Israel's Arab citizens who generally view him as a "racist" in their regard.
Mr. Olmert has obviously wished for Mr. Liebermann to join his heterogeneous government as a way to consolidate its somewhat uncertain parliamentary majority, especially with a view to the forthcoming votes on next year's budget. At the same time, bringing Mr. Liebermann and his party into the government is seen as evidence that Prime Minister Olmert does not intend to negotiate for peace with the Palestinians, or with Syria and Lebanon, in the foreseeable future.
Earlier Mr. Liebermann demanded to be either Defence Minister or Police Minister, which many Israelis would have considered a nightmare. In his new role as "minister for strategic threats" he will be occupied with the threat posed by Iran's apparent quest for nuclear arms, although it is hard to see how this ad-hoc portfolio could be reconciled with the duties of the defence minister. Israel would now have three different cabinet ministers, each other's political rivals, dealing with defence issues at the strategic level: the defence minister (whose job it is), another minister who is in charge of the "strategic dialogue" with the United States, and Mr. Liebermann with his ministry for "strategic threats". In addition, a fourth minister is in charge of the secret services, and yet a fifth minister is in charge of "internal security"...
Prime Minister Olmert has also agreed to cooperate with Mr. Liebermann on changing the shape of Israel's constitutional government, possibly from a parliamentary to a presidential system. Mr. Liebermann, a Russian-speaking immigrant from the former Soviet Union, favours a "strong executive presidency," and his critics say that his model is Russia's President Putin and his authoritarian style.
In one respect though, Mr. Liebermann can be said (in Israeli terms) to be "to the left" of all the present coaliition parties: His extreme right party is secular, not religious, and it favours the introduction of some form of civil marriage in Israel, at least for the sake of those Israelis who are unable to contract religious marriage - the only form of marriage now allowed in Israel. Currently there are some 300,000 (three hundred thousand) Israelis (out of a population of seven million) who simply cannot get married, since they do not belong to any of the officially "recognised" religions. By far most of them are immigrants from the former Soviet Union who were able to come to Israel, because they are children or grandchildren of Jews, but who are not Jewish themselves (because their mothers were not Jewish) while not belonging to any other religion. In the Israeli legal system, every person has to belong to an officially "recognised" religion in order to marry, since the State has reserved jurisdiction over marriages to these religious leaders and their courts.
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