Lapid urges the unity of the coalition to pass the budget; Netanyahu vows to overthrow the government

As the Knesset returns from recess, coalition party leaders speak out at faction meetings and voice their expectations ahead of the winter session, while stressing the need to keep the fragile government intact and pass the state budget – a decision to be made within the next month or the elections are called automatically.

Foreign Minister Yair Lapid told his Yesh Atid faction meeting that the government faces “five weeks in which we have one task: to pass a budget.”

Lapid deplores the fact that various parties in the Islamist-center-right-left coalition, which has a very slim majority in the Knesset, “are each starting to do their own thing, making unnecessary headlines, behaving as if this government should be taken for granted.

“This government is a fragile miracle that has happened against all odds. We all have a responsibility to preserve the coalition and not to create unnecessary battles, ”he said.

Mansour Abbas, the leader of the Islamist Ra’am party, says he expects other coalition parties to honor their promises. However, he specifies that “we have not formed a coalition to dismantle it, we want it to continue to exist and to function”.

Meanwhile, opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu said during his Likud meeting that his party would soon be back in power.

“Israeli citizens see how bad this government is,” Netanyahu said.

He adds that members of the coalition “think they are safe, but we have already been in opposition with 12 seats (in 2006-2009) and have come back strong. This is what will happen again. It will happen because of their failures. To do this, we will keep our determination and our unity.