ANNEXATION

request. Haskel made clear to Abbas that if he prevented the bill’s passage, she could make it harder to pass his faction’s bill recognizing three Bedouin villages in the Negev.

Following the Knesset’s summer recess, the focus in the coalition will shift to passing the state budget. The heads of the opposition Joint List will meet with Bennett and Alternate Prime Minister Yair Lapid this week to present their demands for supporting the budget.

In an interview with Meet the Press on N12 on Saturday night, Joint List leader Ayman Odeh said that his party will not support a budget “that harms Israel’s weakest citizens,” that he said Finance Minister Avigdor Liberman was leading.

When asked whether or not he would support the budget, he responded that he would not, but interviewer Rina Matzliah cut off the rest of his response. If Odeh announces unequivocally that his party will vote against the budget, the coalition will have a hard time pushing it through.

In an interview with Matzliah on Saturday evening, Abbas called on the Joint List to “stop opposing our role in the government while cutting deals with the Likud under the table.” •