Israel’s Bennett Leaving Govt if Prisoners Released Into Israel: ‘We Will Not Allow Them to Walk All Over Us’
by Joshua Levitt
Naftali Bennett, the Israeli Economy Minister and head of Bayit Yehudi, the Jewish Home Party, said on Friday that his faction adopted his threat to leave the government coalition if more Palestinian Arab convicts are released to preserve Israel’s position in the seemingly moribund peace talks with the Palestinian Authority.
On Facebook, Bennett wrote, “If Israel releases murderers who are Israeli citizens, the Bayit Yehudi will leave this government.”
While the first three of the four tranches planned at the start of the talks were of Palestinian Arabs in Israeli jails, the fourth tranche, which was indefinitely delayed as the talks fizzled, called for Israeli Arabs to be released back into Israel.
PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas “is not the custodian of Israeli Arabs in Nazareth, Tira or the Negev,” Bennett said. “We will not allow them to walk all over us.”