Mofaz: Netanyahu was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, we can't let him continue; Livni lambastes refusal to reopen state budget.
By GIL STERN STERN HOFFMANmofaz livni(photo credit: Ariel Jerozolimski)
The housing protesters on Tel Aviv’s Rothschild Boulevard and in Saturday night’s demonstrations should make their protests political and concentrate on replacing Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu with a Kadima-led government, Kadima leaders and activists said on Friday.Speaking at a special session of the Kadima council at the party’s Petah Tikva headquarters, MK Shaul Mofaz issued a fierce attack against the prime minister.RELATED:PM deserves tent protesters’ ire – but so does Tzipi LivniKadima calls for 2012 budget to be canceled “Netanyahu responds out of fear and anxiety,” Mofaz said. “He has lost touch with reality. He is in vertigo. He can’t control the situation and lead. We must take power away from him.”Mofaz said that the prime minister lacked the courage to take action on either diplomatic or socioeconomic issues.“This guy was born with a silver spoon in his mouth,” Mofaz said. “He doesn’t know what it’s like to pay a mortgage like regular Israelis do. In two years, he has trampled the middle class, harmed the young people who are Israel’s future, and taken away their hope. We can’t let him continue.”Kadima leader Tzipi Livni complained that Netanyahu refused to reopen the state budget to fix price increases. She said he cared only about stopping the protests and not about fixing the situation.Livni called Netanyahu’s economic policies extremists and said they had been proved wrong in other countries.
She said the government’s expenditures on keeping sectarian parties satisfied should anger people who can’t afford an apartment and parents whose children are considering working abroad.Kadima council head Haim Ramon disagreed with attempts by the protesters to prevent their demonstrations from becoming too political. He said that “all protests are political” and aimed at the country’s decision-makers.But a housing protester who attended the event heckled speakers, saying “We know Bibi [Netanyahu] is bad, but you are bad too.”A Likud spokeswoman responded to the attacks by Mofaz and Livni by saying that it was Kadima-led governments that stopped building apartments in the center of the country and roads from the periphery, and didn’t invest in higher education.“Livni is that last person who could speak about such things,” the Likud spokeswoman said. “Kadima is panicking because of its poor situation in the polls. The Netanyahu government can handle the current situation the best.”Israel Beiteinu chairman Avigdor Lieberman called a press conference for Sunday to address the socioeconomic situation and developments in the Knesset.Click for full JPost coverage
