Shaked: Yamina Will Veto Changes to Nation-State Law

By Hamodia Staff

YERUSHALAYIM – Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked said on Monday that Yamina, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s party, would veto any changes to the Nation-State Law.

As political pressure on the issue mounts, Shaked said, “I recommend that my friends in the coalition stop amusing themselves by thinking they can make changes in Basic Laws that are not agreed upon. It won’t happen, as is set in the coalition agreement.”

Shaked’s comments come after Finance Minister Avigdor Liberman said that the government should amend the current law. In addition, Defense Minister Benny Gantz declared his Blue and White party plans to bring forward an equality bill to amend the law.

Shortly thereafter, Justice Minister Gideon Sa’ar also sought to disabuse colleagues that the law would be changed.

“Israel is a Jewish and democratic state. Therefore, the Nation-State Law, which anchors Israel’s identity as a Jewish country, will not be revoked or changed,” Sa’ar said at a faction meeting of his New Hope party, according to The Times of Israel..

Sa’ar maintained that the Nation-State law does not harm individual rights, but said he could support  spelling out the principle of equality in one of Israel’s quasi-constitutional Basic Laws — just not the Nation-State Law.

“The emphasis is on equality in individual rights,” he said.

Liberman claimed on Monday that Shaked’s opposition would not stop revision of the law, as he has a majority to pass it, according to The Jerusalem Post.

He proposed the change after Sunday’s revelation of the name of Lt.-Col. Mahmoud Kheir al-Din, from the Druze town of Hurfeish in the North, who was killed during a firefight with Hamas gunmen while carrying out a special operation in the Gaza Strip in  2018.

Labor leader Merav Michaeli backed Liberman, denouncing the law as “twisted” and said she would do anything possible to change it. 

Foreign Minister Yair Lapid told his Yesh Atid faction that he would vote to amend the Nation-State law, but only if all the factions in the coalition agree, which at this point means he won’t vote for it.

Joint List head Ayman Odeh said he would help pass the bills.

Opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu warned that cancelling the Nation-State Law would result in a mass influx of millions of Muslim migrants into Israel, who would wipe out the Jewish majority.

“Those are their true intentions,” Netanyahu said, referring to the Liberman contingent. proponents of changing the law.