Who Are the Two Leaders of the Tenuous Coalition, Yair Lapid and Naftali Bennett?

 Nadene Goldfoot                                                

Yair Lapid, 58 years old, born November 5, 1963 in Tel Aviv, is an Israeli politician and former journalist serving as chairman of the Yesh Atid and opposition leader in the Knesset. He served as minister of Finance from 2013 to 2014. Before entering politics in 2012, Lapid was an author, TV presenter and news anchor.  Lapid ranked first on the list of the "Most Influential Jews in the World" by The Jerusalem Post. He was also recognized in 2013 as one of the leading Foreign Policy Global Thinkers, and ranked as one of Time magazine's 100 "Most Influential People in the World".  An amateur boxer and martial artist who has also published a dozen books, Lapid was a newspaper columnist before becoming a presenter on Channel 2 TV, a role that boosted his stardom, and he once featured on lists of Israel's most desirable men.

Lapid grew up in Tel Aviv and London. His childhood home in Tel Aviv was in the Yad Eliyahu neighborhood, in a residential building known as the Journalists' Residence, as several prominent journalists lived there. He attended high school at the Herzliya Hebrew Gymnasium, but struggled with learning disabilities and dropped out without earning a bagrut certificate.  He is married to journalist Lihi Lapid, and lives in the Ramat Aviv Gimel neighborhood of Tel Aviv. He and his wife have two children, and he has another son, Yoav (born 1987), from his first marriage. He attends the Daniels Centers for Progressive Judaism, a Reform synagogue in Tel Aviv.

He began his mandatory military service in the Israel Defense Forces in the 500th Brigade of the Armored Corps. During the 1982 Lebanon War, Lapid suffered an asthma attack after inhaling dust kicked up by a helicopter, and was pulled from the Corps. He then served as a military correspondent for the IDF's weekly newspaper, Bamahane ("In the base camp"). After completing his military service, he began working as a reporter for Maariv and published poetry in literary journals. Maariv is associated with Israel's political center and has been critical of Benjamin Netanyahu's center-right government.  He also had a career as an amateur boxer.

 Yair is the son of journalist and politician Yosef "Tommy" Lapid, who also served as Justice Minister, and novelist and playwright Shulamit (Giladi) Lapid. His father was born in Novi Sad, Yugoslavia, now Serbia, and his maternal grandfather was from Transylvania, Romania. These places are outside the Pale of Settlement, where so many Jews have been from.  He has a sister, Merav, who is a clinical psychologist. Another sister, Michal, died in a car accident in 1984^] Both of his grandmothers were alive when his parents moved to Israel. His great-grandmother Hermione Lampel was arrested in Serbia and sent to Auschwitz, where she was murdered in a gas chamber.  

On 17 May 2020, Lapid became the Leader of the Opposition, after the thirty-fifth government of Israel was sworn in. Lapid serves on the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, and the Sub-Committee on Intelligence and the Security Services. 

Since 5 May 2021, he is in the midst of talks with other parties to try to form a coalition government.  On 2 June 2021, Lapid informed Israeli President Reuven Rivlin that he had formed a new governing coalition with Naftali Bennett and was prepared to replace the incumbent prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

                                                                                        

Naftali Bennett, 49 years old,  was born in Haifa, Israel, on 25 March 1972. He is the youngest of three sons born to Jim and Myrna (Lefko) Bennett, American Jewish immigrants who moved to Israel from San Francisco in 1967, a month after the Six-Day War. His father's Jewish roots come from Poland, Germany, and the Netherlands. His maternal grandparents moved to San Francisco from Poland 20 years before the outbreak of World War II, and relocated to Israel as seniors, settling on Vitkin Street in Haifa. Through his paternal grandmother, Bennett is a descendant of the Rappaport rabbinic family and of the Medieval Biblical commentator Rashi. Some of his mother's other family members who remained in Poland were murdered in the Holocaust.  That, we have in common.  My father's line also claims Rashi as being on our tree.  Bennett has two brothers. One, Asher, is a businessman now based in the United Kingdom. The other, Daniel, is an accountant for Zim Integrated Shipping Services.  Bennett's wife, Gilat, is a professional pastry chef. She was secular, but now observes the Jewish Sabbath and religious Jewish kosher laws regarding food. The couple have four children, and live in Ra'anana, a city 20 kilometres (12 mi) north of Tel Aviv. Like his brothers, Bennett adheres to Modern Orthodox Judaism.

Naftali Bennett attended Yavne Yeshiva High School in Haifa, and became a youth leader ("Madrich") with the religious Zionist youth organization Bnei Akiva.

Bennett was drafted into the Israel Defense Forces in 1990. He served in the Sayeret Matkal and Maglan commando units as a company commander. Bennett was discharged from active service after six years, but continued to serve in the reserves and attained the rank of major. Bennett served during the First Intifada and in the Israeli security zone in Lebanon during the 1982–2000 South Lebanon conflict. He took part in many operations, including Operation Grapes of Wrath.

After his regular IDF service, Bennett received a law degree from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.  During the Second Intifada, he participated in Operation Defensive Shield. He was called up as a reservist in the Maglan special forces unit during the 2006 Lebanon War and participated in a search and destroy mission behind enemy lines, operating against Hezbollah rocket launchers.

After moving on from software entrepreneurship, Bennett returned to Israel from the USA and embarked on a career in politics. After taking part in the 2006 Lebanon War, Bennett joined the Leader of the Opposition, Benjamin Netanyahu, and served as his Chief of Staff from 2006 to 2008. He led a team that developed Netanyahu's educational reform plan. He also ran Netanyahu's primary campaign to lead the Likud party in August 2007. On 31 January 2010 Bennett was appointed director-general of the Yesha Council and he led the struggle against the settlement freeze in 2010. He served in this position until January 2012.

Following his election to the Knesset, Bennett had to renounce his U.S. citizenship, which he held as the son of American parents, before he could take his seat. He was appointed Minister of the Economy and Minister of Religious Services in March 2013. In April 2013 he was also appointed Minister of Jerusalem and Diaspora Affairs.

Naftali Bennett is an Israeli politician who served as Minister of Diaspora Affairs from 2013 to 2019 and as Minister of Defense from 2019 to 2020. He has led the New Right party since 2018, having previously led The Jewish Home party between 2012 and 2018.   Bennett announced on 30 May that he would serve as prime minister in a potential unity government until September 2023, at which point Lapid would take over.

This is something when you have a Reformed and a Modern orthodox Jew working together to make Israel  and even better place than it is, or at least keeping it together in one piece.  Usually Israel has had one person at the helm but now we are juggling two.  When Netanyahu was trying to create a budget, the thing today is to consider how money is divided between religious and secular matters.  

                                                                    

The thirty-sixth government of Israel will be the next expected cabinet of Israel, and is expected to be formed after the 2021 Israeli legislative election.

On 2 June 2021, a coalition agreement was signed between Yesh Atid, Blue and White, Yamina, the Labor Party, Yisrael Beiteinu, New Hope, Meretz, and the United Arab List.

If the government is confirmed in the Knesset, it will have two prime ministers during its duration. Namely, under a rotation agreement, Naftali Bennett of Yamina will serve as prime minister until September 2023, when he will cede the position to Yair Lapid of Yesh Atid, who would hold office until November 2025. In addition, the New Right/Yamina and Yesh Atid would become the fourth and fifth parties, respectively, to lead an Israeli government – following Mapai/Labor Party (1948-1977; 1984-1986; 1992-1996; 1999-2001), Likud (1977-1984; 1986-1992; 1996-1999; 2001-2005; 2009-2021), and Kadima (2005-2009).

                                                                               

                Yair Lapid giving a speech at Sapir Academic College in November 2015

In 2016, Lapid presented his platform, the "Seven Point Plan for Israel", which includes:

1. A robust security doctrine, 

2. A regional conference with Arab states based on the necessity of separating from the Palestinians, 

3. Reforms of the political system to clean up corruption,

4. A State of Israel that strikes a balance between its Jewish and democratic character, 

5. A strengthened law enforcement system, an economy propelled forward by innovation, 

6. Increased emphasis on education and science.

7. Under Lapid,  Yesh Atid claims to spearhead the fight against corruption in Israel. The "Nachshon Plan", unveiled in 2017, stipulates that any person found guilty of corruption will be banned from serving in public office. To prevent political bribery, it also abolishes "coalition funds".'

                                                                             

          Bennett at the pre-election foreign-policy debate at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 8 January 2013

In spite of his expressed right-wing views against a Palestinian state, while engaged in coalition negotiations for a unity government with Yair Lapid and other party leaders following the 2021 Israeli legislative election, during which he was offered the Prime Ministership, Bennett agreed to a policy of not annexing any territory in the West Bank and to not build any new settlements while serving as Prime Minister in a potential unity government

       In January 2013 Bennett said, "There is not going to be a Palestinian state within the tiny land of Israel", referring to the area from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea. "It's just not going to happen. A Palestinian state would be a disaster for the next 200 years."

In June 2013, Bennett said that Israel must learn to live without separation of the 2 States

    Bennett suggested in June 2013 that Israel must learn to live with the Palestinian problem without a "surgical action" of separation to two states: "I have a friend who's got shrapnel in his rear end, and he's been told that it can be removed surgically, but it would leave him disabled... So he decided to live with it. There are situations where insisting on perfection can lead to more trouble than it's worth." Bennett's "Shrapnel in the butt" quickly became widely known as representing his view of the Palestinian problem.

Update: 6/7/2021 3:30pm  But Bennett is also different in fundamental ways from all 11 men — and one woman — who will have preceded him as Israel’s leader. Assuming his coalition government does not fall apart before it can be sworn in, Bennett, 49, will be Israel’s first prime minister to identify as religious, rather than secular. And he will be the first to have lived in one of the Jewish settlements in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, which are illegal under international law.

Resource:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yair_Lapid

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naftali_Bennett

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maariv_(newspaper)