Prime Minister Naftali Bennett announced on Monday that he would disband his alliance with eight different ideological parties, one year after taking office, and send the country to the polls. A series of campaigns by Yamina’s party had removed the majority in the Israeli parliament known as the Knesset from the coalition. Bennett cited the coalition’s failure earlier this month to extend a law that provides West Bank settlers with a special legal status as the main impetus for new elections. His main ally, Foreign Minister Yair Lapid, will become caretaker Prime Minister until a new government is formed after the October elections. Welfare Minister Meir Cohen, a member of Lapid’s Yesh Atid party, told the Israeli public broadcaster Kan that the coalition would bring the bill to a preliminary vote on Wednesday. “We hope to complete the process within a week,” Cohen said. “The goal is to finish it as soon as possible and go to the polls.” A parliamentary committee approved a preliminary vote on the dissolution of parliament on Wednesday, with a final vote expected early next week. New elections increase the likelihood that former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the current leader of the opposition, will be able to return. Netanyahu was ousted from the eight-party alliance after four ineffective elections that were widely seen as referendums on his ability to govern. The factions of the alliance range from liberals opposed to Israeli settlements to radical supranationalists who reject the Palestinian state. It was only their opposition to Netanyahu that brought them together. Netanyahu is currently on trial for corruption, but has denied any wrongdoing, dismissing the allegations as a witch-hunt by his political opponents. Israeli law does not explicitly state that an accused politician cannot become prime minister. As politicians prepare for the autumn elections, many members of the coalition have invoked the possibility of passing a law before the dissolution of the Knesset that would bar a lawmaker accused of crime from serving as prime minister. Finance Minister Avigdor Lieberman said the goal of Yisrael Beytenu’s party in the upcoming elections was “to prevent Benjamin Netanyahu from returning to power”. Along with the bill to dissolve parliament, he said he would pass legislation Wednesday to ban a lawmaker accused of taking over as prime minister. “I hope that this bill will also find a majority,” he said at an economic conference hosted by the Israeli Institute for Democracy. Justice Minister Gideon Saar, leader of the New Hope party, told Army Radio that his party had supported such a bill and would vote in favor if it were presented to parliament.
