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Former Labor politician faults the left for supporting Netanyahu

In an interview with Al-Monitor, Ophir Pines lamented that the left has not challenged Israel's right-wing government on the diplomatic and defense fronts, but said a historic opportunity lies ahead for regime change.
Ophir Pines-Paz, Israeli Minister of Science, Technology, Culture and Sport, attends a cabinet meeting in Jerusalem October 30, 2006. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert won cabinet approval on Monday for a far-right faction to join the government, a partnership likely to complicate any attempts to revive Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts. Pines-Paz of the Labour party voted against Avigdor Lieberman and his party's inclusion and announced his resignation from Olmert's cabinet in a televised news conference
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The Jewish tenants who moved into 25 apartments in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan on Sept. 30 really irked former Labor Party Minister Ophir Pines. Not because it was a provocative move by the right wing designed to make it hard to divide the city; there have been similar actions in the past. What upset Pines is the silence of the center-left parties.

Pines — who remembers very different days of activism by the peace camp and a leadership that knew how to shape an alternative — uncharacteristically decided to write a finely honed, painful and critical post on his Facebook page. He signed off with this message: “There once was a peace camp in Israel, but no more.”

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