Before the final results of the Kadima primary were in, party chairwoman Tzipi Livni publicly labeled those MKs who joined her rivals camp as deserters. She went on to tell interviewers that if she were to win, these deserters would organically remove themselves from the party list. Livni must have forgotten that she herself was among the deserters who abandoned the Likud to join forces with Ariel Sharon when he founded Kadima. Back then, as opposed to the democratic Kadima vote this week, Livni and her friends stole votes from the Likud. And though a majority of the registered Likud voters specifically indicated in a referendum, initiated by Sharon, that they did not support the policy of the Left (withdrawal from Gaza), Kadima chose to betray their voters trust and use their votes to implement the policy of their political rivals. Livni and Mofaz were then second string members of Kadima, behind high-ranking party officials like Ehud Olmert, who is currently standing trial for a plethora of criminal charges, Haim Ramon, who was convicted of sexual harassment, Abraham Hirschson, who is serving time in prison, and Tzachi Hanegbi, who was convicted of committing perjury (the state prosecutor even wanted to appeal the leniency of his sentence but was prevented from doing so due to a strike). It appears that it was actually the Likud that enjoyed a thorough organic removal of unwanted individuals in the migration to Kadima. Mofaz did not appear to suffer from too many pangs of guilt either. I still have a personal letter he wrote me, a registered Likud voter, telling me that people dont leave their home and that he would always remain loyal to the Likuds values. That letter was not worth the paper it was written on, because by the time it arrived in the mail, Mofaz had already joined Kadima, casting aside the lofty Likud values of loyalty and integrity values that he expounded on in his letter. Now, after Mofazs Kadima primary victory, political analysts surmise that several members of the losing camp will quit the party. It is not inconceivable that a group of political refugees will soon be seeking a new home. It is safe to assume that the one-time Likud deserters will now remember the home they had left and start to loudly sing its praises. That is why I now call on the Likud institutions to close their gates to these refugees, not to take back a single MK who went with Sharon back in the day, and even tried to demolish the Likud. The Likud must not accept back into its fold those very individuals who undermined the partys public image, especially since their political actions namely the withdrawal from Gaza ultimately facilitated the firing of missiles on more than a million Israeli citizens. Any other course of action would be unjust and unethical.
