Some Outstanding Issues Regarding Israel's New Government
Nathan Jeffay:
After giving cabinet posts to everyone he [Netanyahu] promised during coalition agreements there are 30 ministers, eight deputies, and new furniture in the cabinet room to accommodate everyone. In fact, it is the biggest government in Israeli history.
When Olmert built a 25-member cabinet Netanyahu described it as wasteful to an unprecedented degree.
He went on to strongly support a bill to cap the government at 18 ministers.
One of the instigators of this move was Likud lawmaker Gideon Saar who is now education minister. At the time, Saar said, “The cost of appointing so many ministers constitutes a waste of public funds at the expense of essential needs.”
And what about the political machinations of Sheldon Adelson, largely ineffectual in America but all-too-successful in Israel:
Yisrael Hayom (translation: “Israel Today”), founded in 2007 by American billionaire Sheldon Adelson, has always promoted a right-wing agenda. It has been rumored that he only started the paper to get his friend Netanyahu in to office — a claim given exposure last year in a New Yorker profile of Adelson.
So what now? If it has achieved its aim, will it fold? In interviews this week, Adelson said no.
Even if it does close, its journalists shouldn’t be too worried. After all they did to swing the election, and given the new ethos on cabinet building, they could probably find jobs in Netanyahu’s new cabinet.
After giving cabinet posts to everyone he [Netanyahu] promised during coalition agreements there are 30 ministers, eight deputies, and new furniture in the cabinet room to accommodate everyone. In fact, it is the biggest government in Israeli history.
When Olmert built a 25-member cabinet Netanyahu described it as wasteful to an unprecedented degree.
He went on to strongly support a bill to cap the government at 18 ministers.
One of the instigators of this move was Likud lawmaker Gideon Saar who is now education minister. At the time, Saar said, “The cost of appointing so many ministers constitutes a waste of public funds at the expense of essential needs.”
And what about the political machinations of Sheldon Adelson, largely ineffectual in America but all-too-successful in Israel:
Yisrael Hayom (translation: “Israel Today”), founded in 2007 by American billionaire Sheldon Adelson, has always promoted a right-wing agenda. It has been rumored that he only started the paper to get his friend Netanyahu in to office — a claim given exposure last year in a New Yorker profile of Adelson.
So what now? If it has achieved its aim, will it fold? In interviews this week, Adelson said no.
Even if it does close, its journalists shouldn’t be too worried. After all they did to swing the election, and given the new ethos on cabinet building, they could probably find jobs in Netanyahu’s new cabinet.
posted by hellisotherpeople at 10:28 PM
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