Tel-Chai Nation

The Times of Israel noted how on the left, even Yair Lapid, despite an otherwise embarrassingly bad ad attacking the Haredi parties, has been extremely muted or silent altogether on the more valid, challenging issues surrounding UTJ's chairman, Yaakov Litzman, and even the now traitorous Avigdor Lieberman hasn't actually confronted the issue:

The police recommendations, published Tuesday, to charge Deputy Health Minister Yaakov Litzman with bribery, fraud and breach of trust will likely not have any effect on the election result for his party, United Torah Judaism. Most ultra-Orthodox voters will not see anything wrong with the help Litzman allegedly gave pedophile Malka Leifer and the Goldy’s deli, where he would purchase products and which was cited for health violations.

But still, one would have expected the saga to play into the hands of Litzman’s opponents — including Avigdor Liberman, for example. But the secularist Yisrael Beytenu party leader, who has long been under corruption investigations himself, loathes law enforcement authorities even more than he objects to a coalition with the ultra-Orthodox parties.

More interesting is the reaction to the Litzman case — or rather the lack thereof — by the Blue and White party’s number 2, Yair Lapid.

The Litzman case seemed to come at the ideal time for Blue and White’s leaders — on the heels of a video Lapid published on Sunday in which he mocked the ultra-Orthodox for demanding funds in coalition talks. Litzman, Lapid’s arch-rival, is suspected of bribery and fraud, which seems to reinforce Lapid’s argument: The Haredi politicians love public money and are only interested in themselves and their associates.

But everyone in Blue and White kept silent — not one word about Litzman, and not one word about the ultra-Orthodox. As of Wednesday morning, Lapid had still said nothing.

It’s possible that eventually he’ll feel compelled to speak out about a matter that he is, after all, passionate about. But for the time being, Lapid has more to lose than to gain by opening his mouth.

In the eyes of some of his colleagues at the top of Blue and White, Lapid is ruining whatever chance the party had of winning the September elections and wresting the leadership from Benjamin Netanyahu. It is safe to assume that Tuesday was dedicated to internal debates and quarrels in the party, despite the show of togetherness for the cameras on the Gaza border by its leading foursome.

Here's the thing: they want to court the Haredi parties for forming a government coalition themselves, and Lapid alone is ruining everything for them. But he's decidedly making things worse by not officially condemning Litzman for his own violations of the law. Lapid was accused of relying on antisemitic tropes for the ad he posted, with even his own party coming out against him. And yes, it's possible he did lose his grip on sane approaches, though if Litzman condemned him, I would argue Litzman's not qualified for panning Lapid's poor conduct. But in any event, as it's turned out, the left for some are otherwise not interested in alienating the Haredis since they've viewed them as perfect coalition partners far longer than one would think.

Still, as the following report tells, the attorney-general is set to impose limits on how Litzman can conduct business now as an indictment looms:

Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit is likely to limit the authority and powers of Deputy Health Minister Yaakov Litzman (United Torah Judaism) in light of the Israel Police recommendation to prosecute him in two separate criminal investigations.

The Israel Police said Tuesday there is sufficient evidence to bring charges against Litzman for fraud, breach of trust and witness tampering in two cases, one of which relates to the extradition of former Melbourne school principal Malka Leifer, who is accused of child sex abuse and the second involving the business of a close associate.

This will surely moot the issues, but in any case, practically everyone's missed a chance to make a valid case against Litzman, to say nothing of his own party for tolerating this. That said, it's good if the AG will be putting brakes on Litzman's influence, and it'll hopefully force him to resign his post, which he never deserved to have in the first place. Then, I figure the the leftists will resume courting the Haredis more clearly again, just confirming how opportunistic they really are, and never really cared about serious subjects to begin with, as Ehud Barak's previously mentioned associations with Jeffrey Epstein make clear.

Labels: haredi corruption, Israel, Knesset, misogyny, Moonbattery, political corruption