Thorny family reunification bill hits new coalition snags
Coalition chairwoman Idit Silman (Yamina) postponed to next week a vote set for Wednesday on a controversial ordinance preventing family reunification of Palestinians and Arab-Israelis due to new complaints from the Ra’am (United Arab List) Party.
Compromises were reached in a lengthy meeting late Monday night attended by Silman, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked (Yamina) and Ra’am head Mansour Abbas. At the conclusion of the meeting, there was hope that the ordinance could be passed on Wednesday.
The participants agreed on a series of measures that could enable Ra’am to vote in favor, including enabling Palestinians who marry Israelis to obtain health treatment and driver’s licenses in Israel and granting exemptions for couples married before they were prohibited from living in Israel in 1993. Shaked agreed to help humanitarian cases.
But on Tuesday, Ra’am MKs came under pressure from such families, and they backtracked.
Ra’am MK Waleed Taha called the ordinance racist and antidemocratic and said he would not vote for it even if it brought down the coalition. Two more Ra’am MKs joined him, leaving Abbas alone.
On Tuesday, Labor MK Ibtisam Mara’ana, who is an Arab married to a Jew, suggested new compromises, including exempting older couples and forming a committee to deal with humanitarian cases instead of Shaked dealing with them.
Abbas downplayed the dispute to his coalition partners, saying his MKs were adjusting
to being in a coalition for the first time.
Silman also decided to not bring the ordinance to the Knesset Arrangements Committee she heads to decide what committee would legislate it.
Meanwhile, Haifa City Councilwoman Naama Lazimi was sworn into the Knesset on Tuesday. Lazimi (Labor) replaced Public Security Minister Omer Bar Lev, who resigned from the Knesset via the Norwegian Law, which enables ministers to quit the parliament in favor of the next candidate on their party’s list and allows them to return if they resign from the cabinet.
Bar Lev was the 14th minister to resign from the Knesset as part of the Norwegian Law since the government was formed nine days ago.