Inside Israel Today: Behind the Scenes at the Political Ambush

[Music] you're listening to inside Israel today you kill Huffman on the Land of Israel Network hello and welcome to inside Israel today on the land of israel network on the land of israel comm and a very exciting tuesday here in jerusalem last week's show i taped on monday because i wanted to be able to speak about christmas and it ended up being a very interesting decision because later that day our government fell apart prime minister benjamin netanyahu initiated the election and from then on it has been non-stop political insight excitement here in israel in as parties keep on splitting up and people keep on fighting as tends to happen in an election so here we are one week later and in my first show that i'm doing about this election there will be many fun exciting shows about the selection here and inside israel today we will be interviewing people candidates you will get to know them you will find out more and more about this election but today's show is created under duress because there's so much going on as we speak this morning I went to the Knesset for what I thought would be a an average normal boring speech by a biga by the leader of the Labour Party at the beginning of the Zionist union faction the Zionist union that was formed by Isaac Herzog and sit believe me ahead of the last election than 124 seats and then avi gob I inherited when he won the Labour Party leadership against Isaac Herzog but I'm sitting there I'm one of only three reporters there okay because it's the last day of Knesset and nobody cared anymore and there was a press conference at the same time of your lipids Yesha tea party in Tel Aviv where he was unveiling one of his candidates for the next Knesset her name is orna barb eva hi she is the most decorated woman the history of the IDF very special lady and everything but I live in Jerusalem I went to the event in Jerusalem and while sitting there avi GABA starts speaking against Tzipi Livni says you know what this partnership isn't working I really gave it a try and then ends it by saying JP good luck in whatever party you run with in the election CPP wrote the formula casualty not moving I'm Lila came very much she knew she a mr. Oakley and I look around at the faces all the different Knesset members who you know a few minutes ago we're just looking in every direction except GABA because they have so little respect for him these are his MKS and they were in complete shock from Tzipi Livni on down she was sitting right next to him as he was speaking as he was slapping her face on live television announcing in a way that only Donald Trump could you're fired you're fired well at least Trump has a tradition of saying you're fired so it shouldn't really surprise anyone anymore here there was so much more drama than any kind of reality television show she looked like she had sucked the most sour lemon in the world and I felt so bad these Knesset members around the table have been going through a very tough time the Zionist union had 24 seats and the latest polls showed that they would get 8 and that's running together and avi gobby has three seats including for himself reserved in the top seven candidates for people he chooses himself plus the seat for Tippi livening who had the number two slot reserved it's one two three and seven all gone and I can understand the the Knesset members of labor who have worked hard to be in the Knesset and everything saw that they didn't have a lot of hope and so I began I guess I felt that he had to do something and this other something that he did that you'd think he would try to you know make a bond with another party but no one wanted to make a bond with him been against just wanted to stay on the sidelines and not taint himself by attaching himself to the left-wing Zionist Union Party the last thing you want to be in Israel right now is the leftist I said with nobody willing to join together with the Zionist union Abu gob I decided to break it up now avi GABA is anger had been growing for a long time when Isaac Hertzog left to become the chairman of the Jewish Agency the job of opposition leader opened and living he kind of blackmailed God by into giving it to her and when he gave it to her she didn't say thank you she didn't praise God by she didn't make him sell him to Israel and to the world as the next prime minister it was very clear to the people that she had nothing really good to say about him and she didn't like him that she didn't think that he's a serious candidate for Prime Minister and it was very much mutual there's going to be a press conference of Tzipi Livni as soon as I leave this recording that I'm doing in the twenty five minutes I have off between exciting press conferences never a dull moment in Israeli politics especially when people are angry at each other and you could see that this anger that gob I had against Tzipi Livni had been growing and growing for months that there this it was going in this direction but still you'd think that they would have had to keep the partnership together at least ahead of an election you you want to show that that you can get along but they couldn't irreconcilable differences overcame them and it's a real shame that's if you live knee who is a very respected around the world as a a statesman as someone who can defend Israel very well explain Israel very well now is condemned to going into her fifth party in ten years she grew up in the liquid part her parents were among the closest followers of Jabotinsky they were involved in the right-wing groups that founded the state and her her mother was terrorist in the eyes of the British she was appointed by Netanyahu in Netanyahu's first term 96 to 99 as the head of the company's authority and that LEDs are her running for Knesset in the Likud and when the time came for RL sharone to form the Kadima party she was really the architect of it she really rose through the ranks politically because she was one of the Dubs inside the Likud and she then after she helped force out it would Omer she became the leader of the party but then she herself was forced out by Shaul Mofaz after she failed herself at building a government after Omer was forced out after she was given a chance to form a government and she failed and we thought maybe she should get another chance again but it's not looking like that will happen after mofos showed her the door she formed a party called Hatsune WA her third party which she headed and led to six seats and Hatsune wah joined with labour to form the Zionist union which she ran under than 2015 election that was her fourth party with the interesting it's hard to even remember this looking back she was the co-leader of the party together with Hertzog until the last week they were Co candidates for Prime Minister of this party they were supposed to have some kind of rotation if their party would have won the election until they realized about a week before the election it wasn't looking so good in Aten Yahoo captain saying uh and vote for me not sippy and bougie Hertzog knowing that sippy was an Electra liability according to his polls and so only in the last week of the election the Zionist union said actually it's only Hertzog was gonna be the candidate for Prime Minister once Hertzog left Livni didn't have a party leader sticking up for her making sure that she's going to be okay gob I would meet with leaders and then not take her with there's plenty that she can complain about from the behavior of God by but to run in your fifth party in a decade would look very very bad for Tippi Livni she is someone who I guess never really fit in in the Labour Party with their big history of David ben-gurion and it's hawk Robin and shimon peres and as she said that as someone who grew up in that Lee could household she couldn't run as labour itself avi gob I said he tried to merge the parties and she didn't feel comfortable doing that and now the question is what is she going to do I mean we're going to find out quite soon when this press conference happens and you know do you do these radio shows and you never know what is gonna happen immediately after them I can't do the radio show like a minute before you listen to it but it could be the end of the political career particularly I doubt it cuz she's a fighter and there are another ten parties she could potentially enjoin but that would be a shame regardless of political views because she is such a professional and even if you're strongly against withdrawing from land which he's the top advocate of she's a good person I've gotten to know very well this is a woman who lives on chocolate eats nothing but chocolate I've never seen any food but chocolate she's a vegetarian which means sheets chocolate and she has done so much over the last twenty years she's been in like 10 different ministerial portfolios that she held but as the leader of a party she was not a nice to the people under her it's not nice to Shaul Mofaz she was not nice to i'm remits 'no who ran in her hats new out party and then was shown the door same thing with mayor she treat these are people who've done a lot for this country and she was not very respectful to them now avi gaba is someone who's never I've never seen him be really respectful to anyone the the MKS who supported him first when he ran for the leadership of the Labour Party he did not reward them he was not nice to them after he got elected and they became his biggest enemies and critics avi gob I built himself up from a development town in the Jerusalem's Tokyo neighborhood that was built hastily for immigrants from North Africa in the Middle East he grows from that just because of his own intelligence to become a millionaire who was the head of the basic telephone company for a while and today when he wasn't delivering a speech he said I learned from all the people who picked on me back then never to believe people when they say I can't do it I can do it everyone has been doubting me lately saying that that I'm not gonna be Prime Minister and yes I believe that I will be Prime Minister I'm not gonna let anybody bring me down and you have to respect that kind of courage afterward there was a meeting of the Labour Party MKS behind closed doors but things in Israel don't stay behind closed doors very often so there were MKS inside who were reporting to the press outside that gob I used not such polite language when describing litany he said that since I gave her the job of opposition leader all I got from her was he used the word that is not a nice word that he talked about how she has behaved terribly to him he talked about how the party had to go in a different direction and the Knesset members for the most part supported him but there were a couple who said that they felt very uncomfortable with how he was so disrespectful to sippy Livni and there was 8 on Kabul who said why don't you consult with us why are you so disrespectful to us this is our political future that you're gambling on they getting rid of her and so the drama is continuing to go on as we speak now this isn't the only drama that there's been over the last week you also had Naphtali Bennett and the yellow chick had leave their party the by dudy party for a new party that they're calling hi Amina kadosh the new write that it will run on its own in this coming election and then I think will join the Likud after that no matter how many seats they get because I yelled and Naphtali want to be Prime Minister and I yell it has a good chance of being Prime Minister one day if she's able to join the liquid party which was the ruling party they couldn't have made the jump from by the UD directly to Li could but this new party that they formed it's a little bit of a weigh station that can facilitate that happening everyone is getting ready for the post Netanyahu era and these elections are really seen as a kind of a midterm election away station on the head ahead of the election that really really matters and so everyone is taking the steps now that they need to do in order to be ready when Netanyahu will be forced out by the criminal investigations and it will only intensified so you see near Barca the mayor of Jerusalem who is entered national politics and is running together with me could so he'd be there when something happens to Netanyahu you'll see more and more decisions that are made that don't really have the best interests of the politicians in mind for this election but are really intended for another election it could be only even a year later because the criminal investigations of Netanyahu are so serious now there's also things going on that are less weighty for Israel's future but matter to the English speakers here in Israel we had great representatives in the outgoing Knesset two american-born Knesset members he who declic in Michael Oren a canadian-born Knesset member in Sharon Haskell and others who had citizenship or called Azaria and I don't think any of them are gonna be coming back it's gonna be very tough for any of them to come back Michael Oren had fights with his Collado party leader Moshe Kok alone he's looking for a new political home but not looking very very intensely he seems to have been satisfied with a political career that he that he had over the last four years and I don't know if you heard a click will be reelected it's gonna be very tough to be reluctant inside the liquid party and we're looking ahead who are going to be the next congressman if you will of the English speakers who are here in Israel you have so much to contribute to Israeli society and to Israeli politics I would love to go on speaking more and more about this excitement ladies and gentlemen I've got to go back to my day job I've got to go back to the Knesset and tell people around the world what's happening here behind the scenes and all the excitement in Israeli politics so stay tuned to more shows that there will be week and week out here on land of Israel network on the Land of Israel calm inside Israel today and also stay tuned to WWJ post calm down we'll be out thank you very much hi folks Josh hastin here host of Israel uncensored on the Land of Israel network at the Land of Israel calm this week an exclusive interview with dr. Seth transmen op-ed editor at The Jerusalem Post he has been to Turkey he's been to Iraq he's been to Kurdistan to cover regional conflict here in the Middle East it may not immediately affect us but at the larger picture is that with the u.s. reducing its footprint and I think also leading to a lot of questions about how erratic the Trump administration is before me hear what he has to say about the u.s. decision to pull US troops out of Syria don't miss the show exclusively here on the land of Israel network at the Land of Israel combats Israel uncensored with Josh huisman this week don't miss it