Netanyahu tells Likud MKs: Compare Shaked to Livni
Netanyahu revealed to the Likud politicians that the party’s strategy would continue to be to woo voters away from its satellite parties on the Right.
By GIL HOFFMANPrime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promises to do all he can to build a coalition in a press conference Monday 27.05.2019(photo credit: NOAM REVKIN FENTON / FLASH 90)
Likud ministers and Knesset members should attack Yamina leader Ayelet Shaked in interviews by comparing her to former minister Tzipi Livni, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told them in a meeting at the Likud’s Tel Aviv headquarters on Tuesday.Netanyahu revealed to the Likud politicians that the party’s strategy would continue to be to woo voters away from its satellite parties on the Right, especially Yamina, which he said was a fair target because it is not at risk of failing to cross the electoral threshold. He said the Shaked comparison to Livni could be effective, because of Livni’s reputation for shifting from party to party.“She [Shaked] is the new Tzipi Livni,” Netanyahu told the MKs. “She shopped herself between parties. She has no principles, and she might not recommend me after the election.”Netanyahu’s statements followed Shaked’s admission in an Army Radio interview on Tuesday that after her New Right Party did not cross the threshold in the April election, her plan was to join Likud but not run in the next election and build herself up gradually in the party.Shaked said she was blocked by Culture and Sports Minister Miri Regev, who she said felt threatened by her. After Regev said that Shaked had “begged to join Likud,” Shaked pointed out that Regev herself considered joining Labor and enthusiastically served as the IDF spokeswoman for the withdrawal from the Gaza Strip.“Miri Regev invented the word ‘opportunism’ in politics,” Shaked said.The Likud released two new campaign ads on Tuesday. The first compares Blue and White leader Benny Gantz to former prime minister Ehud Barak, painting Gantz as a leftist who is unfit to be prime minister.In the second ad, Netanyahu poses as a lifeguard on the beach, protecting the people, while mocking political opponents like Barak, Yisrael Beytenu leader Avigdor Liberman, and Blue and White candidate Moshe Ya’alon. He said Ya’alon had drifted too far to the Left and that Liberman had told the jellyfish he would eliminate them within 48 hours, the same warning Liberman issued to Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh but did not deliver on when he served as defense minister.“Stay on the Right, because it is much safer,” Netanyahu told the surfers in the water in the ad.
