Netanyahu’s main rival in Likud quits party, views premiership
Former minister Gideon Saar takes a huge political risk by announcing he is quitting the Likud and forming a new right-wing movement.
In the late morning hours of Dec. 9, former minister Gideon Saar presented himself at the Knesset speaker’s office to hand in his resignation. Just 12 hours earlier, the veteran lawmaker had dropped a bombshell announcing at a press conference on Facebook his intention to quit the Likud and run against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Saar told the journalists waiting outside the speaker’s office, “I will return in the 24th Knesset as the head of a large political force that will replace the government.”
It is too soon to say whether Saar, for years considered Netanyahu’s natural Likud successor, will accomplish his stated goal of toppling from power Israel’s longest-serving prime minister. However, the political right, in general, and the Likud especially, are clearly being buffeted by storm winds and facing great uncertainty.
Meanwhile, details are emerging of the secret plan hatched by Saar and his confidants in recent months. Communications Minister Yoaz Hendel and Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee Chair Zvi Hauser, currently members of the governing coalition representing the Derech Eretz faction, are expected to join Saar's new party.
