Benny Gantz’s volte-face on Thursday was met with bitter excoriation from his former allies.
“Benny Gantz decided today to break apart Blue and White and crawl into Netanyahu’s government,” declared Yesh Atid leader Yair Lapid, who has spent the past year as Gantz’s no. 2 in Blue and White. “We ran together because Benny Gantz looked me in the eye and said we would never sit in this bad government. I believed him.”
And what did Gantz have to show for the breakup, Lapid seemed to wonder. “What’s being formed today isn’t a unity government and not an emergency government. It’s another Netanyahu government. Benny Gantz surrendered without a fight and crawled into Netanyahu’s government, joined the haredi-extremist bloc,” he said.
In an important sense, he’s certainly right. Gantz appears to be the most obvious loser from his decision to join Netanyahu.
He surrendered his most valuable cards just as the fight was reaching its climax, with Blue and White finally in control of the Knesset and a new speaker set to be voted in, and just as Netanyahu, fearful of a Knesset set against him, was for the first time begging for serious unity talks.
As Yesh Atid MK Ofer Shelah put it bitterly on Thursday, “at the moment of truth, Gantz crumpled.” READ MORE