Israel has formed a new government,
essentially ousting Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu from office.
He has been the prime minister for
the last 12 years and
this was really an interesting
effort by a coalition government
meant to oppose him, oust him.
And this coalition government is
essentially a group of
smaller parties.
Many of which have giant
disagreements with one another but
have one agreement which is
the importance of ousting
Benjamin Netanyahu from
the position of Prime Minister.
Now Naftali Bennett is the new
prime minister and the coalition
government for the first
time includes Arab representation.
Yair Lapid will
be Bennett's coalition partner.
Now let me give you
some more details.
The Israeli parliament on Sunday
approved the new power
sharing government by Bennett,
the Orthodox leader of Israel's
religious-nationalist movement and
a former Netanyahu aide
in a close vote of confidence,
60 to 59 with one abstention.
Now, I want to note, I'm sure
you've already noticed that we're
talking about a prime minister who
worked very closely with Netanyahu
as an aide, someone who's described
as a religious nationalist.
And that's obviously relevant for
anyone who's wondering if this new
coalition government will lead to
a significant changes in
the treatment of Palestinians.
It does not appear to be the case
especially given the leadership
here, and given the only real
agreement that the coalition
government has, or the various
parties in the coalition has, and
that is just the effort to oust
Benjamin Netanyahu,
who to be quite frank has been
incredibly brutal to Palestinians.
And has been an authoritarian
leader.
Now, the new government is fragile.
Again, I want to really
emphasize that.
And Netanyahu's Likud run
government will now be replaced
with a hodgepodge of Israeli
parties that came together around
the prospect of removing
the sitting Prime Minister,
despite their limited agreement on
a few issues.
I want to get to the White House's
response to this but before I do
so, I also want to provide a video
of Benjamin Netanyahu's final
speech as prime minister because he
did not in any way appreciate this
effort and is not happy about
the fact that he's been ousted from
being Prime Minister.
So he kind of had this scorched
earth reaction to it.
Let's take a look.
[FOREIGN] >> He doesn't have
the international stamping.
He doesn't have the credibility.
He doesn't have the ability.
[FOREIGN] >> He doesn't have
a government, he doesn't have-
[FOREIGN] >> The ability to put up
genuine opposition and from all
the differences, of which there
are many- [FOREIGN] >> Between
us and the incoming government.
This is the most important and
fateful difference for
the future of the State of Israel.
An Israeli Prime Minister must be
able to say no to the President of
the United States on matters that
endanger our existence and
to back this up with a massive work
in Congress, in the Senate,
and in public opinion into
the greatest democracy which is
the United States.
[FOREIGN] >> That is what I did
in 2015- [FOREIGN] >> When I
spoke in the US Congress,
despite the opposition.
The fierce opposition of
the president of the United States,
who will do this now?
Prime minister Yair Lapid?
Who attacked my speech in Congress
because most members of
the government designates support
the nuclear agreement.
>> So what Netanyahu is referring
to there, of course is the 2015
nuclear agreement with Iran.
Benjamin Netanyahu also had
a tumultuous relationship with
President Barack Obama because
Obama had the audacity to
demand that Netanyahu stop building
settlements in the West Bank and
the Gaza Strip.
And so that's what he's referring
to what he says that I was the one
who was willing to go
against the United States and
he's trying to make this accusation
that Naftali Bennett will govern
differently but there is really no
indication that's the case and
Cenk I want you to take it over
from here about that issue.
>> So as usual this is a topic that
requires a lot of nuance but
the first part of it is clear,
down goes Netanyahu!
Down goes Netanyahu, I couldn't be
more happy about that, so
thank you Israel for
making that happen, Netanyahu is
the worst of the worst.
He's basically Dick Cheney and
Donald Trump combined.
So he has the warmonger tendencies
of Dick Cheney and
also to some degree Donald Trump,
and he's a personally corrupt
pathological liar.
Total narcissist,
has started several conflicts for
his own political benefit,
he's a monster.
So good riddance,
he was in office here for
12 years in a row.
Previous to that, he was an office
for three years, 15 horrible
years at least in terms of
the political governance of Israel.
And it only led to more conflict,
more war, more oppression.
He will not be missed by anyone
outside of rabid right wingers who
wanted nothing but more war.
Now, the reason it's
nuanced is because
his replacement is not much better.
Historically some of his statements
have been even worse than
Netanyahu's.
Now, but that's not the end of
the story either, he is part of
a coalition government.
In a parliamentary system you must
have, almost always, sometimes you
can win an outright majority,
but almost always a coalition
government, and it
depends on who's in your coalition.
But first let's tell you what
a terrible guy Naftali Bennett is.
Now you're not going to get this
from any the mainstream media
obviously right now.
My God, Israel, Israel, Israel,
Netanyahu's gone.
They began to realize 88 years too
late that maybe Netanyahu's a rabid
right winger.
And but with Bennett right now,
of course Joe Biden, Blinken,
our secretary state are all like,
that is so
great, so wonderful, yes, yes, yes.
No, that's not true.
Naftali Bennett said, quote, I've
killed a lot of Arabs in my life
and there's no problem with that.
Now look in the military,
you might have killed people, but
when you specifically say I've
killed Arabs and
I have no problem with that, well
that's obviously a toxic comment.
And it gives you a state of mind,
but it doesn't matter.
Every comment is like that.
And when his party's a pro settler
party, they believe that they
should have all of the land and
that the Palestinians hence
accordingly have no rights at all.
And he does not believe in
a Palestinian state.
He actively fights against the one.
On the settlements he said we
should quote build build build and
that's of course over
Palestinian territory.
So in that sense,
he's not only a warmonger,
he's an occupier and remember,
he was deep allies with Netanyahu
before he decided, well why don't I
just take his power right?
And then finally, he said
a Palestinian state is pointless,
and that he would never advocate
for one and never allow one.
So understand that the new boss is
not that different than than the
old boss, but within his coalition,
are moderate parties, is in fact
even an Arab party within Israel.
And it is a tenuous coalition.
It's 60 to 59 in a 120 person
parliament, Naftali Bennett's own
party only a six seats out of 120.
He cobbled together the coalition
and if he goes too aggressively
against Palestinians, presumably
the coalition would fall apart
because of the Arab parties and
the moderate parties, etc.
Which then brings us back to
Netanyahu, who said not
only the comments you saw there,
but he said I would leave you, and
this is very Trumpian, in a daily
struggle against the evil and
dangerous leftist government
in order to topple it.
He says on day one, God willing,
it will happen a lot faster than
what you think, almost word for
word what Donald Trump said.
So that's who Bibi Netanyahu is.
>> Exactly, and one other thing
I wanted to add about Bennett is
in the speech that we showed you or
the portion of the speech we showed
you featuring Netanyahu,
he talks about how he was a far
better leader because of the fact
that he was willing to go
against the United States.
And the Iran nuclear deal which by
the way, as we all know, Donald
Trump ripping up the Iran nuclear
deal did not make the world safer.
It made it less safe and
that's exactly what
Benjamin Netanyahu was demanding.
Well, Naftali Bennett is really no
different, as Axios reports,
Bennett took a hard line on
the Iran, I'm sorry, hard line on
the Iran deal in his speech.
So he gave a speech as well,
saying that it was a mistake in
2015, and it remains one today.
And, it really,
at this point is abundantly clear
that it doesn't really matter who
the prime minister of Israel it is.
You're going to get the same
response from the U.S government.
And I'll give
you the response from Joe Biden.
So, the White House said Biden
offered quote, his warm
congratulations and expressed his
firm intent to deepen cooperation
between the United States and
Israel on the many challenges and
opportunities facing the region.
Biden said his administration plans
to work Closely with the Israeli
government on efforts to advance
peace, security and prosperity for
Israelis and Palestinians.
And underscored his decades of
steadfast support for the US Israel
relationship and his unwavering
commitment to Israel's security.
And that was the end of it.
You also have an official statement
coming from the Pentagon,
coming from the Defence Secretary
Lloyd Austin, a spokesperson for
Lloyd Austin said Secretary Austin
looks forward to continuing
the important cooperation and
dialogue with Minister Gantz.
He will remain
the Defence Minister,
to deepen the US Israel strategic
partnership, the US commitment to
Israel's security remains ironclad.
So while it's great to have
Benjamin Netanyahu out, we also
have to be real about how the US
perspective or perception on peace
in that region remains the same.
And it hasn't been good.
As we know what we
got from the Biden Administration
repeatedly during the latest round
of violence and aggression toward
the Palestinians was Israel
has the right to defend itself.
They're going to continue on
with that talking point and
Naftali Bennett as the prime
minister is really no different
from Benjamin Netanyahu even though
he does, yes, have this coalition
government behind him.
>> So just a quick note on
how similar the governments
are unfortunately,
Gantz was the first minister under
Netanyahu he continues to
be Defence Minister under Bennett.
So and
Gantz is to the left of Netanyahu
because it's near impossible to
be to the right of Netanyahu.
But Gantz is also
the guy who talked about wiping out
the Palestinians in the recent
conflict.
So, yes, there are a lot of
good guys within the moderate and
left wing Israeli politics.
And we applaud the fact that they
helped to get Netanyahu out.
Not a lot of peaceful folks
in the right wing of Israeli
government have said vicious
things about Palestinians and
they plan to continue
the occupation it seems for now,
forever and ever but one last thing
about our role in this as America.
One of the selling points for
Naftali Bennett was I will get
along with both Republican and
Democratic presidents and
Netanyahu endangered Israel
by picking your side and
only supporting the Republicans.
And that's why you saw Netanyahu
say what he said, I have courage I
took on the Democrats.
We don't need no stinking
Democrats.
By the way democrats still while he
was an office,
what can we do for you?
He's spitting in your face.
You can actually have courage and
stand up to him.
Anyways, but Bennett's position is
basically, no, we're not going to
give the Palestinians a state and
if need be, we're going to keep on
bombing them.
We're just going to get
the Democrats to support us just as
much as the Republicans.
That doesn't really make
it any better.
So be clear about that.
And Biden saying effusive praise
and over and over again,
anything you want my beloved ally,
doesn't help the situation.
Yes, Canada, UK, Israel are allies,
but it doesn't mean that we should
take any right wing leader of that
country and go, anything you want.
No matter what you do,
we will definitely support you.
That is not a strong position.
And that's not a position that
progressive should back.