Likud MKs Caucus on Blocking PA Interim Accord

For every action on the part of the United States and the European Union to press for a peace agreement with the Palestinians, there is an opposite, if not always equal, reaction from right-wing politicians in the Israeli government coalition to resist such pressure.

Deputy Defense Minister Danny Danon on Sunday convened right-wing leaders and activists in the Likud central committee he heads to confer on strategies for blocking any interim agreement with the Palestinian Authority, The Jerusalem Post reported.

The meeting came after  President Barack Obama renewed his pledge to Mideast peacemaking at the U.N. last week.

Danon stressed that the event was not anti-Netanyahu. Instead, they targeted Justice Minister and chief negotiator with the PA, Tzipi Livni.

“We won’t sit silently while Livni cooks up an unacceptable deal,” Danon said. “We can’t let there be industrial quiet.”

The Likud activists decided to focus their lobbying on the Likud’s top four ministers: Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon, Interior Minister Gideon Saar, Home Front Defense Minister Gilad Erdan and Energy and Water Minister Silvan Shalom.

On Sunday, Israeli newspapers carried a full-page ad signed by members of the central committee that lauded two ministers, four deputy ministers and four other MKs for publicly taking a position against giving up land to the Palestinians. The ministers were Erdan and Transportation Minister Israel Katz.

Another full-page ad in the same papers called upon Saar, Erdan, Yaalon and Shalom to fight any further releases of Palestinian terrorists as goodwill gestures in the peace process.

That ad, sponsored by families of terror victims, asked people to join an online petition that has already garnered more than 31,000 signatures.

In addition, the Council of Jewish Communities in Yehudah and Shomron and the Gaza Strip will soon be launching its own campaign, which will feature hawkish quotes by Netanyahu from his 1995 book, A Place Under the Sun.

This article appeared in print on page 6 of the October 1st, 2013 edition of Hamodia.