Will settlers bring down Netanyahu again?
Israel's right-wing activists have forgotten the trauma of bringing down the Netanyahu government in 1999 and are willing to threaten the prime minister with leaving the coalition if their demands are not fulfilled.
HaBayit HaYehudi ministers Naftali Bennett and Ayelet Shaked arrived at the Ofra settlement for a closed-door meeting with its leaders on the night of Feb. 4. It had been a very tense weekend in the West Bank following the forced evacuation of the Amona outpost in keeping with a Supreme Court ruling that HaBayit HaYehudi could not block. When the Supreme Court issued a similar ruling over nine homes in the established settlement of Ofra, its residents began a vigorous campaign to overturn the "evil decree."
As they left the meeting, Bennett and Shaked were verbally assaulted on their way to their limos. Video clips distributed to news sites after the incident show the two ministers being heckled with calls like, "Shame on you! We voted for you to fight for us, not to surrender to Netanyahu!’’
The sight of these two ministers coming under attack offered a glimpse at how the settlers employ pressure on politicians from the right, most notably Bennett as head of HaBayit HaYehudi, in the era of US President Donald Trump. Based on conversations that Al-Monitor had with participants in the closed meeting, the mood was tense and often heated, at least as far as Bennett and Shaked were concerned. While the meeting was not described as aggressive, the messages relayed to the ministers were clear, pointed and often delivered in a threatening tone.
The participants in the Ofra meeting were part of the older, established leadership of the settlement. Ever since Trump was elected, they have adopted an aggressive strategy, employing uncompromising pressure on HaBayit HaYehudi. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is not the right address, as far as they are concerned. They consider Bennett their champion in the government.
