Yisrael Beytenu party chairman Avigdor Liberman underlined his determination to keep the State of Israel from becoming a halachic Jewish state on Monday during a party meeting held to discuss the election of a new State Comptroller.
Liberman acknowledged that he had agreed to support the coalition’s choice of a state comptroller, and said “that is what we will do. Secret votes in the Knesset is a thing of the past. It’s time for public figures to have the courage to vote publicly, and the same goes for the vote for president,” he added.
The former defense minister also underlined his party’s determination to protect the country from religious influence, saying that during discussions with President Reuven Rivlin over the Draft Law, he had said plainly that his party’s job was “to protect the secular majority.”
Liberman expressed particular concern over remarks by MK Bezalel Smotrich, saying that his United Right party wants the Justice portfolio. Liberman warned that Smotrich wants to “return the Torah to its foundation . . . This isn’t crazy hilltop youth,” he said, “this is a serious candidate for Justice Minister. We won’t allow Israel to return to the way it was in the days of King David,” Liberman said.
Smotrich, who made the remarks at the annual Jerusalem Day celebrations in the Mercaz HaRav Yeshiva in Jerusalem, actually said quite a bit more than a simple remark about King David. Liberman missed much of it, apparently. Here’s a bit more, from a tweet that Smotrich posted a little later: “As in the days of King David with accommodations to fit our time. Reality has changed, and so has the law, which upholds the principles of justice and integrity and adapts itself to reality (just like any other legal system).”
Among the statements that provoked Liberman was a basic contention that Smotrich and his party want “the justice portfolio because we want to restore Torah law to its status,” and then explained further by citing the reference from the Shemonah Esrei (Amidah) prayer, recited three times every weekday by observant Jews, “Restore our judges as in former times.”
Smotrich later responded to Liberman’s deepest fears in an interview broadcast on 103 FM Radio: “What hurts me is mainly the ignorance, which spawns nonsense . . . Those who want to remain ignorant and only run and scare – I can only wish them well.”