New faces, old tactics
Some unhappy news: Negotiations to form the next government will last until almost the last minute. It's doubtful that newly appointed ministers will be able to tailor their new suits in time for U.S. President Barack Obama's visit in late March.
For Likud-Beytenu, Yair Lapid is the biggest riddle. It's possible that the questions surrounding him could become clearer on Thursday during his meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, but things are more complicated than that.
According to experts, the obstacle of a dwindling national budget can be overcome, barely, and the disagreement over issues pertaining to Israel's foreign policy can be solved with relative ease. "Two states for two peoples" will be absent from the government's basic guidelines, but Netanyahu will reiterate his commitment to peace in the speech he will deliver upon Obama's arrival.
In reality, only the equal sharing of the national service burden is stalling matters. The ultra-Orthodox, Sephardi and Ashkenazi alike, are hinging their hopes on their most venerated rabbis to prevent mandatory service and vow that they will not agree to retreat one inch from their position. Every possible coalition calculation shows that even if Hatnuah and Kadima (eight Knesset members in total) join the government, there still will not be enough votes to approve Lapid's proposal, which calls for the postponement of mandatory enlistment for a period of five years. For this, Netanyahu will need Naftali Bennett's 12 seats to get a coalition of 70 MKs.
The refusal by Shas and the ultra-Orthodox to compromise is worrying because accepting Lapid's proposal would only lead to the enlistment of haredi youths in another five years. By then there will have already been another election, after which, based on the results, the law's implementation can be delayed or the law itself can be altered.
However, if the haredim hold firm, the government will find itself in front of the High Court of Justice, which will need to determine why, in the absence of a new law, it is not enlisting all citizens equally, including the yeshiva students (those who actually study and those who don't), according to the wording of the current law.
In essence, if the haredim are rejecting Lapid's proposal with such confidence, then it is possible that they already have an assurance from Likud-Beytenu that the new law will be watered down; and they therefore have no more interest in continuing negotiations from this point.
The issues that gain more clarity in coming days will once again be put back on the negotiating table in mid-March, toward the end of Netanyahu's allotted time to form a government. The waste of time is a shame. The agitation is a shame.
Every party participating in negotiations has "red lines" that it holds close to the chest. That's also a shame; they should share these red lines for all to see. Perhaps then we would learn that the differences between them are actually much smaller than they appear to be in the newspaper headlines.
The political world is currently in a state of flux. It has new symbols. Only the old-fashioned slowness in which negotiations are conducted hasn't changed.
טעינו? נתקן! אם מצאתם טעות בכתבה, נשמח שתשתפו אותנו