Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By admin on December 18, 2019

Rabbi Rafi Peretz

Noam Rivkin Fanton, Flash 90

Education Minister Rabbi Rafi Peretz, chairman of the Jewish Home party, pushed back against Transportation Minister Bezalel Smotrich's (National Union) demand to hold party primaries.

The two parties have run as a joint list since 2013, and currently there is a demand to unite the joint list into a true single-faction party. MK Ayelet Shaked, formerly of the joint Jewish Home-National Union list and then of the New Right party, also supports the idea of holding open primaries. Shaked led the joint list when it joined a "technical bloc" with the New Right party prior to the September 2019 elections, and polls show that if the Jewish Home party held open primaries, she would win the top spot.

As a result, the Jewish Home party has begun claiming that the push for primaries is intended to unseat Rabbi Peretz.

In recent days, Rabbi Peretz has come out against Shaked, claiming that she nearly destroyed Religious Zionism's political representation by creating the New Right party with Defense Minister Naftali Bennett, and that she failed to win the chair of any party prior to the previous elections, but insists on trying again, at the expense of the Jewish Home.

"How is there even a thought to bring Ayelet back? If I had brought seven Knesset seats at the head of a Religious Zionist list, they would kick me out, criticize me," Israel Hayom quoted Rabbi Peretz as saying in closed conversations with those close to him. "She's acting as if nothing happened. How can it be that just a year ago they nearly destroyed Religious Zionism, and yet despite this she received a prize - leading the list - and she failed, and now she wants the top spot again? I was living a clam quiet life and they brought me in to save things, we did good work the first time, we brought in five Knesset seats, six with Rabbi Eli Ben Dahan, and now she's starting everything over? Does she have no self-respect?"

"Does she want to come back to the Jewish Home? Happily. She can join the list and run when the time comes. Why under the sun should she be at the head?

"It's a shame that she and Smotrich are working together to hurt me," he added. "In the end it harms Religious Zionism and the entire nationalist camp."

Israel Hayom quoted Shaked as responding that "Rabbi Rafi, who is currently bringing one percent in the polls, should not talk about seven Knesset seats. In addition, a political leader has nothing to fear from primaries. A democratic process is not ousting. His party's Central Committee is demanding primaries. He needs to answer to them about why he's refusing."

Rabbi Peretz has rejected all suggestions on uniting the parties, Israel Hayom noted, despite the fact that all the others in his party support the move.

More:
Peretz: I gave in to Shaked, and now she's undermining me - Arutz Sheva

Category: Zionism
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