Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's coalition decided on Nov. 26 to delay the Knesset vote over the loyalty in culture bill that would allow cuts to government funding for institutions not showing "loyalty" to the state. The coalition didn't have sufficient votes to guarantee its adoption. By delaying the vote, Netanyahu’s floundering coalition was forced to lower a major banner. Still, he chose to ignore the raucous commotion taking place all around him.
On that day, just two hours before the Likud’s Knesset faction was scheduled to convene for its weekly meeting, a new fight broke out among two prominent figures in his coalition: Culture Minister Miri Regev (Likud), and Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon (Kulanu chairman). The two of them seemed to have been cooperating recently, but then Kahlon decided to grant the members of his party the freedom to vote according to their conscience on the loyalty in culture bill, which was proposed and advanced by Regev. This controversial piece of legislation had become a paradigm of the aggressive tactics being taken by the most right-wing nationalist government in Israel’s history. Then, in the blink of an eye, the chances of it passing seemed to disintegrate. Former Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman’s resignation left a narrow coalition of just 61 members so that Kahlon’s decision meant that the law didn’t really have a chance. Having estimated that the coalition would soon fall apart anyway, Kahlon was determined to prove his independent spirit by distinguishing himself from the Likud.
