This issue with the budget and the Draft Law looks like it might turn into a real crisis.
The Finance Minister, Betzalel Smotritch, is supposed to bring the new budget to the government by October 29 so that it has enough time to be passed by the end of the year. To note, if the budget does not get passed in time, the Knesset automatically disperses and the country goes to elections.
The Draft Law is on the docket and the Haredi parties are upset that it has been repeatedly postponed, causing all sorts of problems for them (especially the issue of subsidized day care).
After several threats to get the Draft law passed that saw the Haredi parties back down at the last moment, Minister Goldknopf recently repeatedly threatened several times to not allow the budget to pass unless the Draft law is passed first. As well, other laws would be blocked until the Draft Law is passed. The general thinking has been that as always they wont carry through with the threat and will back down at the last moment because they dont want to bring down the government, and in the worst case scenario Bibi will pay them off in some way to back down again. This time though with Goldknopf stepping up the threats it might be a real crisis.
Additionally, Smotritch responded to Goldknopf's demand of passing the Draft law before the budget saying it isnt going to happen. Some Likud MKs also spoke up today saying they will not support the Draft Law. Ben Gvir spoke up saying drafting to the IDF needs to be incentivized, and he is against forcing - people are taking that as supporting the Haredi position but he never said he would support the Draft Law so in my mind it is still unknown what Ben Gvir will do.
In an attempt to stave off the crisis, PM Netanyahu called a meeting of the heads of the coalition parties.
Interestingly, reporters have been reporting that Smotritch, Deri and Gafni did not participate in this meeting. So basically, if accurate, this meeting became one of Netanyahu, Saar, Ben Gvir, and Goldknopf.
I still think that Netanyahu has a card up his sleeve and may call for early elections, dispersing the Knesset. This solves the budget issues (which rumor has it the budget isnt ready) and the Draft Law issues. And, recent polls continue to show Netanyahu growing in power and popularity back to pre-war times. if Netanyahu trusts those polls and his internal polling supports the numbers as well. This very well might happen. I dont make predictions but I wouldnt be surprised if this happens. If he was really smart, he would do it over a hostage deal, but doing it over the draft law isnt so bad for him either if no hostage deal is to be had in a timely fashion. It may be his only solution if he cant get everyone to toe the line.
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