Avigdor Lieberman to Join ’Israeli’ Gov’t, Become War Minister

Local Editor

"Israeli" Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met Wednesday afternoon with the so-called "Yisrael Beytenu" leader Avigdor Lieberman to discuss adding his party to the governing coalition and even offered him the positions of War and Immigrant Absorption ministers.

Lieberman accepted Netanyahu's offer to take the military portfolio, and the two hope to finish negotiations to join the coalition by Friday morning.

According to Ynet, if Yisrael Beytenu joins the coalition, the current minister of immigrant absorption, Ze'ev Elkin, is expected to receive the limited economy portfolio including just industry and trade.

Senior officials involved in the negotiations estimated, "This will be closed on within 24 hours. The chances that Lieberman will join [the coalition] are very high. It's nearly finished."

Netanyahu's Likud party announced officially following the meeting with Lieberman that "The meeting was straightforward, was run with a good attitude, and, at its conclusion, it was decided to establish negotiation teams. The prime minister is updating the leader of the opposition on the details."

Netanyahu also spoke with current War Minister Moshe "Bogie" Ya'alon by telephone to inform him that his position had been offered to Lieberman.

"I've been hearing a lot of times in the media that we received one proposal or another," Lieberman said earlier in the day. "Supposedly there have been countless of mediators and emissaries, which I read in the papers have offered us the defense and immigration absorption ministries, pension reforms and the sentence to terrorists. In fact, we have not received any official proposal."

Lieberman was speaking after Channel 10 reported on Tuesday evening that Netanyahu had offered him the War Ministry several days ago, even before War Minister Moshe Ya'alon's speech Sunday that led to a public rift between Ya'alon and the "Israeli" prime minister.

Lieberman said he knew he would not be able to receive all of his demands. "We have several demands, but we want to see the full package. It's clear to us we're not getting 100 percent, but I want to see the final mix," he said.

Earlier, Leader of the Opposition Isaac Herzog stated that he would not hold coalition negotiations with Netanyahu while Lieberman was holding parallel talks.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team