Shinui: We don't mind religious partners in coalition, but not in cabinet

The Jerusalem Post ^ | 3 February 2003 | GREER FAY CASHMAN

[anotherview]

Feb. 3, 2003
Shinui: We don't mind religious partners in coalition, but not in cabinet By GREER FAY CASHMAN

Stepping out of a half-hour meeting with President Moshe Katsav, Shinui Party representative Eliezer Zandberg said his centrist party would agree to join a governing coalition with religious parties, but not with cabinet ministers from these factions.

Zandberg said he told Katsav his party favors setting up a broad-based secular coalition under Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, with the Labor Party and "any other Zionist party" that chooses to join.

He said Shinui "has no bias against Shas or United Torah Judaism," the two ultra-Orthodox parties in the Knesset. But while he can envisage these parties joining Sharon's coalition, "per se", he "could not see them sitting at the same cabinet table" with Shinui, due to vast differences in views on economic and social policies.

Shinui has called for eradicating special subsidies paid to the religious community and for abolishing laws that requires religious weddings.

[anotherview]

This is the first time Tommy Lapid has said he would sit in a coalition with Shas, and is further backtracking from his campaign promise not to go into a coalition with haredi parties.

[BenLurkin]

There is nothing mysterious about the history of God's chosen people. When they trust in God they thrive, when they reject God they fail. This party may not want to recognize this fact but it is foolish to actively blackball those who do.