Heavy pressure from the right on the coalition ahead of the publication of President Yitzhak Herzog’s outline. Voices in Likud and the coalition refuse to compromise on the sections in the outline, such as the composition of the committee for appointing judges and the majority required to invalidate laws at the High Court.
In the prime minister’s office, the coalition’s senior officials gathered in favor of consolidating the maximum sector boundaries in relation to the president’s outline. In the hours before the publication of the President’s outline, they were looking for the formula according to which they would be able to accept the outline and also so that it would not appear to the right-wing voters as if they had succumbed to the opposition’s pressure and folded.
In the Prime Minister’s office were present Prime Minister Netanyahu, Aryeh Deri, Ministers Yoav Kish, Ron Dermer, Cabinet Secretary Yossi Fox, and Minister Yariv Levin, who is swearing at his father and talking on the phone. Finally, Simcha Rothman, chairman of the Constitution Committee, who conducted the last meetings in March, entered and caught most of the fire.
At this stage, the chairman of the legal department of the Kehalat Forum, one of the leaders of the reform, Aviad Bakshi, an associate of Minister Smotrich who is abroad, Yehuda Eliyahu, as well as other right-wing figures were called to the Knesset – in order to exert weight on the ministers in the government not to compromise with Herzog’s compromise proposal.
The fear on the right was that the outline that the president would present would not meet the changes that the coalition asked to make, with the major disputes remaining the composition of the committee for the appointment of judges and the majority required in the High Court to invalidate laws. MKs in the coalition have recently spoken strongly about the reform compromises, as well as Likud activists and members of the right. On the other hand, MKs in Likud such as Yuli Edelstein and Avi Dechiter claimed that a stop should be made in order to reach negotiations.