When the three Shas chiefs arrived at the prime minister’s office on Sunday afternoon [March 3], they already understood what awaited them. They had internalized the fact that their entire election strategy had failed and that their alliance with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, which had seemed rock-solid to them, was smashed in a knock-out blow by the surprising new political alliance between Yesh Atid leader Yair Lapid and HaBayit HaYehudi leader Naftali Bennett.
Outgoing Ministers Eli Yishai, Ariel Attias and Aryeh Deri — who saw his dream of returning to the government crash into smithereens — still carried a last-minute hope-against-hope that Netanyahu would surprise them with a rabbit-out-of-a-hat solution that would leave them in the government. But instead of that, they heard him say that he has no choice, that Yair and Naftali do not allow him, that with great sorrow he is forced to dispense with them, that perhaps appropriate conditions would emerge later on.
