Lapid vows to mend ties with Democrats, change 'reckless' Netanyahu policies
Israel’s Foreign Minister Yair Lapid has vowed to return to a bipartisan approach toward the United States.
Israel’s new foreign minister, Yair Lapid, pledged on Monday to mend ties with the US Democratic Party, which he said had been abandoned by the recently ousted government of Benjamin Netanyahu.
His comments came a day after the Israeli Knesset formally approved Lapid’s diverse coalition government on Sunday, bringing to an end a record straight 12 years of Netanyahu rule. Right-wing Yamina leader Naftali Bennett was sworn in as Israel’s new prime minister, and Lapid as both chief Israeli diplomat and alternate prime minister.
Speaking at a ceremony in Jerusalem on Monday, Lapid accused Netanyahu of damaging ties with the US political party that's currently control of both the White House and Congress.
“The management of the relationship with the Democratic Party in the United States was careless and dangerous,” said Lapid, who heads the centrist party Yesh Atid. “The outgoing government took a terrible gamble, reckless and dangerous, to focus exclusively on the Republican Party and abandon Israel’s bipartisan standing.”
