Kahana Reappointed as Religious Affairs Minister

By Yisrael Price

YERUSHALAYIM – Yamina MK Matan Kahana will return to his post as religious affairs minister, after the government approved it pending a vote to confirm in the Knesset plenum later on Monday.

Kahana had stepped down, or shifted, to the position of deputy religious affairs minister in order to fill the Knesset seat of Yamina’s Yomtob Kalfon, who was ousted on suspicion of planning to defect from the coalition.

However, Kalfon told Channel 12 news on Monday that he was innocent.  “I was shocked when Bennett removed me from the Knesset. I didn’t defect or intend to do so,” he was quoted as saying.

Prime Minister Naftali Bennett ejected MK Idit Silman from the Yamina faction meeting on Monday afternoon after she refused to confirm that she would support the reappointment of Matan Kahana as religious affairs minister, after he resigned from the ministry last Friday.

In response, Bennett asked Silman, “Have you no shame to come here?”

The remaining Yamina members continued the meeting without her.

Silman threw the government into chaos last month when she resigned as coalition whip, removing the coalition’s majority of 61 MKs to just 60 MKs.