Livni quits knesset, says ‘Israel lives atop a volcano’

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Former foreign minister Tzipi Livni quit parliament on Tuesday, a few weeks after her removal as head of Israel’s main opposition party, and accused Israeli leaders of neglecting peace efforts with Palestinians.

“There is an immediate and urgent need to reach a permanent settlement with the Arab world and the Palestinians,” Livni said in televised remarks after handing in her letter of resignation as a legislator of the centrist Kadima party.

She said she would remain in public life, leaving open the option of running in the next election, expected within months, after having missed a series of opportunities to become Israel’s first woman prime minister since Golda Meir in the 1970s.

“Israel lives atop a volcano. The world clock is ticking. The existence of a Jewish and democratic state, which is what Zionism is about, is under serious threat,” said Livni, 53.

Livni, who as foreign minister in a previous Kadima-led government served as Israel’s chief peace negotiator, was alluding to what could be the eventual loss of a Jewish majority unless Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and in the Gaza Strip achieve a state of their own.

Peace talks collapsed in 2010 after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of the right-wing Likud party rejected Palestinian demands to extend a 10-month partial moratorium on building in Jewish settlements in the West Bank.

PARTING SHOTS

Defeated in a Kadima leadership election in March by former defense chief Shaul Mofaz, Livni saved her parting shots for members of Netanyahu’s government, accusing them of “burying their heads in the sand, dealing with maneuvering and spin, while the threat to Israel only rises”.

Livni, a corporate lawyer and a former member of the Mossad intelligence service, fell short in at least two chances to lead the Jewish state.

In 2008, she failed to put together a coalition with ultra-Orthodox Jewish parties after Ehud Olmert of Kadima quit as prime minister in a corruption scandal.

In the ensuing election in 2009, Likud came in second to Kadima. But it was Netanyahu who formed a government with religious factions after Livni proved unable to find any ultra-Orthodox governing partners.

“I do not regret not selling the state to the ultra-Orthodox,” she said in her Knesset resignation comments, alluding to state funds often sought by religious leaders in exchange for supporting the government.

Kadima was founded in 2005 by then-prime minister Ariel Sharon. He had bolted from Likud after party allies turned against him over a withdrawal of settlers from Gaza that he had championed and carried out that year.

Livni took over from Olmert as Kadima leader three years later. Opinion polls now predict the centrist party will shrink to a third of its size in Israel’s next election because of rebounds in popularity for Likud and the Labour party.

Israeli media have speculated that Livni might return to politics soon to join a newer centrist party founded by popular Israeli entertainer and author Yair Lapid.

Reuters

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8 responses to “Livni quits knesset, says ‘Israel lives atop a volcano’”

  1. 5thDrawer Avatar
    5thDrawer

    More parties … more parties …. can’t make biblical/koranic/talmudic prophecies come true without more parties.
    Get your programmes here …

  2. 5thDrawer Avatar
    5thDrawer

    More parties … more parties …. can’t make biblical/koranic/talmudic prophecies come true without more parties.
    Get your programmes here …

  3. BillRind Avatar
    BillRind

    she is an Ashkenazi jew like the majority of them are in Israel. They are not the lost tribes of Israel which Christ came to save from there sins. the majority of the lost tribes were all dispersed and headed, North, East and Western Europe. These frauds are from the lineage of the Canaanites and Edom, They are of Esau’s brood, all frauds and not people of the books of Moses. they follow there own Talmudic instructions and its filled with hatred of Christians. I don’t trust these Zionist Jews at all.    Ask any one of these frauds where they came from they won’t tell you, because they know there frauds.  the United states is loaded with these type Ashkenazi jews causing all sorts of trouble within our own system.  The U.S. has many true Jews who live here and are followers of the books of Moses. the rest of them I wouldn’t give you a plug nickel for . it’s the same kind of people with an evil mindset just like in Moses time , when Jannes and Jambres tried killing Moses in Sinai, God opened up the ground and it swallowed up 3000 of these Zionist Pagan Jews, the rest of the story you should know, Moses slew thousands of his so called countrymen because he knew they did evil in the sight of the Lord.

    1. Mariel Avatar

      Judaism is replete with stories of conversion:  Ruth, Hagar, many others.  Why should not the Ashkenazi Jews be converts to this religion?  Your hatred of them is not acceptable.  I’m not one of them but I have studied Judaism, including what it takes to convert.  

      1. BillRind Avatar
        BillRind

        If they convert to what they are supposed be teaching and learning then I won’t have a problem with them, since you studied you should know this, who stoned and murdered your prophets, it was this same  kind, please don’t ever forget that. Herod was a monster and murdered his own kind, he was a herodian, from the lineage of Esau.

  4. BillRind Avatar
    BillRind

    she is an Ashkenazi jew like the majority of them are in Israel. They are not the lost tribes of Israel which Christ came to save from there sins. the majority of the lost tribes were all dispersed and headed, North, East and Western Europe. These frauds are from the lineage of the Canaanites and Edom, They are of Esau’s brood, all frauds and not people of the books of Moses. they follow there own Talmudic instructions and its filled with hatred of Christians. I don’t trust these Zionist Jews at all.    Ask any one of these frauds where they came from they won’t tell you, because they know there frauds.  the United states is loaded with these type Ashkenazi jews causing all sorts of trouble within our own system.  The U.S. has many true Jews who live here and are followers of the books of Moses. the rest of them I wouldn’t give you a plug nickel for . it’s the same kind of people with an evil mindset just like in Moses time , when Jannes and Jambres tried killing Moses in Sinai, God opened up the ground and it swallowed up 3000 of these Zionist Pagan Jews, the rest of the story you should know, Moses slew thousands of his so called countrymen because he knew they did evil in the sight of the Lord.

    1. Judaism is replete with stories of conversion:  Ruth, Hagar, many others.  Why should not the Ashkenazi Jews be converts to this religion?  Your hatred of them is not acceptable.  I’m not one of them but I have studied Judaism, including what it takes to convert.  

      1. BillRind Avatar
        BillRind

         If they convert to what they are supposed be teaching and learning then I won’t have a problem with them, since you studied you should know this, who stoned the and murdered your prophets, it was this same  kind, please don’t ever forget that. Herod was a monster and murdered his own kind, he was a herodian, from the lineage of Esau.

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