Archive (Photo: Hadas Proosh/Flash 90)
The conflict will wait: The chairman of the Central Election Commission, Judge Yitzhak Amit, today (Sunday) accepted the state’s petition against the Foreign Ministry’s employees’ committee, and ordered that they must send the ballot boxes in the elections to Israeli embassies abroad by next Wednesday – this despite the sanctions of The workers following the conflict at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It was also determined that the committee will be required to pay expenses of NIS 20,000.
In his decision, Amit criticized the conduct of the employees of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who threatened not to send the ballot boxes abroad for the elections to the 25th Knesset – something that would have prevented state employees abroad from voting as usual. According to him, the committee’s threat was given on Friday and two days before Rosh Hashanah, when the next normal working day is the deadline for sending the ballots in accordance with the law.
“The decision of the respondents not to carry out actions related to the elections as part of their sanctions is puzzling to me,” it says. “The right to vote for a Knesset outside of Israel was granted by the legislature to state employees or to employees of national institutions, who are abroad on election day due to their work. As far as I know, a significant part of those who have the right to choose the embassies are the employees of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs themselves, and the failure of the election materials to reach them on time will mainly harm them.”
The Foreign Ministry Employees’ Committee stated in response that “following the forceful move by Foreign Minister Yair Lapid, after the holiday all suspended sanctions will be reinstated. Foreign Minister Yair Lapid is running away from responsibility for solving the crisis that is deepening and harming the Israeli Foreign Service in these challenging days. The responsibility for worsening the sanctions lies at his door.”
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