Right-winger gets plum job

– Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced yesterday he was relinquishing the role of foreign minister and handing it to a rightwing rival from within his Likud party, Israel Katz.

The move comes ahead of April 9 elections and follows court challenges arguing that Netanyahu – who is also health and defence minister – has taken on too many governmental portfolios.

Katz, 63, is currently transportation and intelligence minister and it was unclear whether he would give those roles up.

He holds right-wing views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and has said conditions are not in place now for a two-state solution.

In 2017, he advocated a plan that critics said would amount to de facto annexation of a number of Jewish settlements surrounding Jerusalem in the occupied West Bank. The proposal was shelved.

He has also proposed building an island off the Gaza Strip to provide the blockaded enclave with infrastructure such as electricity and clean water.

Katz also promotes a plan for a railway linking Gulf states to the Mediterranean via Israel as part of a bid to normalise relations with Arab countries that currently do not have formal ties with the Jewish state.

Netanyahu’s choice of Katz was seen by a number of analysts as part of political manoeuvring ahead of the April 9 polls. – AFP