Israel Matzav

Netanyahu playing dirty in the Likud again

You may recall that before the 2009 elections, Prime Minister Netanyahu played some dirty tricks to move Moshe Feiglin (he whose name must not be mentioned in the Likud) from a realistic number 20 on the Likud list to a pretty unrealistic number 36. Feiglin is not in the Knesset.

Feiglin responded by doing what he does best. He got hundreds - maybe even thousands - of Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria to sign up for the Likud. And now, Netanyahu is trying to dilute their votes as well by increasing the number of 'reserved' spots in the Likud Central Committee for residents of Israel's cities.

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu will convene Likud’s central committee in two weeks in an effort to prevent residents of Judea and Samaria and other hawks from obtaining too much power in the party, Netanyahu told his faction at the Knesset on Monday.

More than 100,000 Likud members will be eligible to vote for a new committee on January 31. Places on the committee are allocated to representatives of Likud branches across the country. Netanyahu said he would ask the committee to approve a 30 percent increase in the number of committee members allocated to cities in order to dilute the power of Likud branches in Judea and Samaria.

Sources close to Netanyahu said the numbers of committee members from the West Bank rose artificially due to an outdated rule passed in 1992. The rule sets the number of committee members from Judea and Samaria based on how many people in the region voted Likud in the last election.

In other regions, the committee member totals are based on the region’s voter registration drive.

“This is a reasonable way to deal with the situation,” Netanyahu said, according to those present in the closed-door meeting.

Once again, Netanyahu is trying to change the rules in the middle of the game. But the question is whether the current Central Committee members - who have already helped Netanyahu to consolidate power once in this election cycle - will have enough integrity to say no to his second request. Well, maybe.

Labels: Binyamin Netanyahu, Likud Central Committee, Moshe Feiglin

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 9:47 AM