Goldknopf speaks (Walla system!)
The demand of the chairman of Torah Judaism Minister Yitzhak Goldknopf to stop the Israel Railways works on Shabbat returned the political system to a similar storm that occurred five years ago, at the end of which Minister of Health Jacob Litzman resigned from his position in the government. Then, as today, it all started with a letter of demand from Litzman to stop the works, Following the disregard of the Prime Minister, the ministers and the professionals until the moment when it was no longer possible to turn back the wheel, Litzman's resignation caused a headache for Netanyahu, but did not bring down or significantly harm his government.
Two events in Israel's political history led to the overthrow of governments - in December 1976 the first Shabbat crisis broke out which led to the overthrow of the government and the bringing forward of elections.
The reason: a state ceremony to receive the first F15 aircraft in Israel, which took place at the Tel Nof base at noon on Friday and was extended after the beginning of the Sabbath, which caused the desecration of the Sabbath by ministers in the government.
Following this, MK Rabbi Kalman Kahane of the Agudath Israel workers submitted a motion of no confidence in the government in which two of the three Ministers of the Israel Defense Forces abstained.
Prime Minister at the time Yitzhak Rabin took a step later referred to as the "brilliant exercise" - he chose to see their vote as a resignation and dissolved the Knesset, which led to early elections and the rise of the Likud and Menachem Begin to power.
In September 1999, the second severe Shabbat crisis broke out, called the "Mishnah crisis".
The background: an operation to transfer Mishna - huge parts of turbines of the electric company - which was decided to be held on Saturday in order to reduce as much as possible the traffic disruptions.
The result was the withdrawal of Torah Judaism from the coalition of the Ehud Barak government.
The party was not a member of the government, which continued to serve until December 2000, but the Mishna crisis was the first sign of cracks in it.
Will bring down the government because of the railway works?
Goldknopf (photo: Reuven Castro)
Goldknopf is a new player in the government and the Knesset and replaced his predecessor in the position - Yaakov Litzman.
In his previous position, he served as the chairman of the Committee for Shabbat, the body that was responsible for the ultra-orthodox boycott against El Al and the AM-PM food chain that operated on Shabbat. Goldknopf is not an independent actor, he, like Litzman, is a representative of the Rebbe of Gor, Rabbi Yaakov Aryeh Alter.
The latter is known for his zeal regarding Shabbat matters in the public sphere, and also in the recent train crisis he was the one who ordered Litzman to put down the keys and submit his resignation until he returned to the government table a short time later.
The crisis began in September 2017 - the heads of the ultra-orthodox parties received internal information that Netanyahu, who served as Prime Minister at the time, intended to grant a permanent permit for the activity of the football branch on Shabbat, following a petition filed by the High Court of Justice. They protested this, and among the consents, the then Minister of Labor and Welfare, H Haim Katz of the Likud pledged that no infrastructure work would be carried out on Israel Railways for a period of one month - during the holidays.
However, two months passed, and Litzman, who received reports about the work done on weekends, sent a message to Netanyahu's office that they would suspend the votes in the ministerial committees and in the government if he did not receive a commitment that they would be stopped.
The ultra-Orthodox and Netanyahu met several times during that period, and a number of proposals were put on the table, such as the promotion of legislation under which it would be established that work approval would be given taking into account "Israeli tradition" or that weekend work would only be performed by non-Jewish workers.
On one of the weekends in November, Litzman hardened his position, at the behest of his spiritual patron, and asked to stop all the work that would be done on that Sabbath.
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Faced similar crises.
Netanyahu (Photo: Roni Knafo)
He then explained to his associates that he is not interested in the elections because it is a "good coalition", but according to him "there are things that are beyond achievements".
After his demand was not accepted - Litzman resigned from his position as Minister of Health, and his resignation somewhat embarrassed his other ultra-Orthodox friends who did not take any significant steps other than a public media protest.
However, they took solace in the fact that Litzman returned to the government table later.
In the last coalition agreement signed with the Shas factions and Torah Judaism, it was stipulated that the representative of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel would be a member of the committee for issuing work permits on Shabbat, this is in contrast to the current situation. How will the continuation of the works cause a significant coalition crisis at such an early stage of the government - but a letter from the chairman of Torah Judaism could also eventually reach the point of resignation.
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Yitzhak Goldknopf
