Bennett picks soccer superstar Eli Ohana for a realistic spot in the Knesset

[edu]

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/190538#.VMdpIdKUc1I 

The Jewish Home party surprised Israelis on Monday evening by announcing that former Israeli soccer superstar Eli Ohana had joined the party.

Ohana, 50, played with the Beitar Jerusalem soccer team for many years and also with several European teams. He is currently the manager of the Israel national under-19 soccer team.

He is expected to be reserved in the number 10 spot on the Jewish Home’s list for the Knesset.

Ohana’s joining the Jewish Home raised some eyebrows, given his past public statements. Ohana has in the past expressed support for the Disengagement from Gaza and spoke out in favor of expelling Jews from their homes.

In 2003, in an interview with the Ma’ariv newspaper, Ohana said, "[Prime Minister Ariel] Sharon can evacuate all the settlements as far as I’m concerned, we have enough land in which to live...only a donkey doesn’t change his mind, the Palestinians want peace."

Two years later, shortly before the Disengagement, Ohana told the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper, "I’m in favor of anything that will bring tranquility and peace, even if it involves a disengagement."

In the same interview, the soccer superstar also revealed then that he considered joining the Kadima party to show support for Sharon, whom he said he was "perhaps the best prime minister there ever was. He made a lot of moves that contradict what he used to think, but he changed with reality, changed his views, and his moves have proven themselves.”

These comments caused an uproar on Jewish Home Chairman Naftali Bennett’s Facebook page on Monday evening, with several users posting on Bennett's wall their objections to Ohana’s joining the party.

The Jewish Home would not comment on Ohana’s past remarks, but he himself explained on Monday evening that he had woken up to reality.

“All my life I was a Likud voter - but I no longer believe in the way of withdrawals, and like all of Israel - I woke up and came home, to the Jewish home. I love the people of Israel, the Land of Israel and the Torah of Israel. I will invest all my energy in promoting those who came, like me, from poor families, with eight brothers, so they will never have to live such lives again,” he said.

Please Comment. Good? Bad? Neutral? Irrelevant?

[edu]

Bennett also picked another former Leftist as #14 on his list
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/190555#.VMdsPdKUc1I

Jewish Home Chairman Naftali Bennett confirmed Tuesday morning that he intends to place Dr. Anat Roth in the 14th spot in the Jewish Home's Knesset list. Bennett noted Roth's move from left wing to right wing views symbolizes Israelis' awakening from pipe dreams of "peace."

Roth's performance in the Jewish Home primaries was lukewarm, and she reached the 22nd spot, which is not considered a realistic one. Polls currently give the party 15 or 16 MKs.

Roth used to be an activist with the leftist Peace Now organization and an advisor to former Labor leaders Ehud Barak and Amram Mitzna, but changed her views years ago. She is currently the Director of Megalim, the Higher Institute for Jerusalem Studies at Ir David and leads a religious lifestyle.

She was also director of the Centers for Deepening Jewish Identity.

Bennett said Roth has “a big Jewish soul.”

"The nation of Israel is sobering up,” he added on Facebook. “The fashion used to be to retreat. To run away. To apologize. The Disengagement was the fault line. The nation understood that this doesn't work anymore. That we have a land and that we did not reach it by accident. That there are no 'security considerations,' 'ideological considerations,' and 'painful concessions.' It's all the same. Either we believe in our right here, or the world will despise us.

"From the amazing houses that we evacuated in the Disengagement, missiles were fired at residents of central Israel, just in the last few months. And the nation is sobering up and joining the Jewish Home,” he added.

Roth, he said, “is a brave researcher and a truth-seeking academician, who goes against the flow without apologizing.”

"After a long period of being connected to the Labor party and working for its senior members, she chose to stop working on a doctoral thesis about the party and research the expulsion from Gush Katif instead. What she learned led her to sober up, without fear, and to rethink everything she had believed in until then.”

"Anat will fight in the Knesset so that no more Jews are expelled from their homes. The Nation of Israel is moving, daily, from the apology camp to its Jewish Home.”

'Reality has set in'

According to Dr. Roth, "The Labor movement and the Israeli left have stocks in the creation of Israel and the Zionist enterprise, but the facts have changed and reality has set in, and the Labor party cannot handle them. The last decade shows us that the desire for peace was and remains a thing of the Israeli side only, and that the processes in the Palestinian Authority and around us show that an Israeli withdrawal from land will lead to the establishment of a terrorist state.”

"Jewish Home is the only party that is correctly reading the map and the processes that take place around us, and is not selling illusions to the public. It connects between secular and religious, and not just talks about unity, but works to strengthen our common ground, our connection to Israel and the Israeli and Jewish and Zionist identity among the people,” said Dr. Roth.

"These are the issues with which I’ve dealt with in the last decade, and I hope I can continue to work for them in the Knesset, with the excellent Knesset members of the Jewish Home," she added.

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I was surprised to read a Hebrew article
http://www.inn.co.il/News/News.aspx/291930
which claims that Feiglin might vote for Bennett's Bayit Yehudi (Jewish Home ) party because of Bennett's choice of Eli Ohana.

[edu]

Some of the so-called Gush Rabbis in the Hebrew article
http://www.srugim.co.il/105710-%D7%A8%D7%91%D7%A0%D7%99-%D7%94%D7%92%D7%95%D7%A9-%D7%91%D7%94%D7%A8-%D7%94%D7%9E%D7%95%D7%A8-%D7%99%D7%9B%D7%95%D7%9C%D7%99%D7%9D-%D7%9C%D7%94%D7%AA%D7%97%D7%99%D7%9C-%D7%9C%D7%A8%D7%A7%D7%95
are unhappy with the choice of Ohana, because they say Ohana's whole career was built on public Sabbath Desecration and it is going against Jewish values to have Ohana represent the Jewish Home party.

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Rabbi Meir Kahane's #2 man in the Kach party (Rabbi Ariel) had this to say about Bennett's choice of the soccer player and also commented on Eli Yishai and Otzma
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/190567#.VMesu2iUcmM

Rabbi Yisrael Ariel, director of the Temple Institute, condemned the "factionalism" as her termed it in the religious public as opposed to the unity seen in other sectors, and also criticized Jewish Home's recent Knesset list addition, Israel soccer superstar Eli Ohana.

"People don't notice what's happening these days, the Arab parties that united and according to the polls will receive 12 mandates," said the rabbi in an Arutz Sheva interview on Tuesday.

Rabbi Ariel appraised "that means there's no question every shekel entering the settlements will be stopped by the Arab MKs who will be very dominant in the coming Knesset. There's a true danger here that we are all in, and it's shameful that opposed to the Arab unity, there is a sick factionalism in religious Judaism. The right doesn't feel the danger that is lurking at our doorstep."

Jewish Home cannot currently represent the religious Zionist Torah world according to the rabbi, who responded sharply to party chairman Naftali Bennett's decision to reserve a seat - likely the number ten spot - for Ohayon.

"We've turned into a soccer field, taking anyone - with all due respect to everyone - but they will be our leaders, they will lead (those in the yeshivas) Merkaz Harav, Har Hamor and the hesder (combined IDF service) yeshivas, who will lead us? Soccer players?" posed Rabbi Ariel.

Sharpening his criticism, the rabbi said "a Jew who doesn't observe Shabbat and whose values are dictated by his (Knesset) seat - that's not a (political) party, that's a joke."

The move has received general criticism given that Ohayon in the past supported the 2005 Disengagement plan, saying in a 2003 interview "(then-Prime Minister Ariel) Sharon can evacuate all the settlements as far as I’m concerned, we have enough land in which to live." Recently Ohayon claimed "I no longer believe in the way of withdrawals."

Yishai's "egoistic pettiness"

Remarking on the breakdown in talks this week for a joint list between former MK Dr. Michael Ben-Ari's Otzma Yehudit and MK Eli Yishai's Yachad - Ha'am Itanu, in which Otzma Yehudit requested the fourth and sixth seats as opposed to just the sixth, Rabbi Ariel called on Yishai to relent and give Ben-Ari a realistic spot with the fourth spot.

"There were attempts to integrate Ben-Ari with Eli Yishai, and instead of doing that while facing the Knesset taking shape, they're going to destroy things. Everyone knows that Eli Yishai isn't succeeding in getting together his public that is still with Shas, there's no content there," he said.

"On the other hand, Ben-Ari had 67,000 people that voted for him (in the last elections), he almost got the (needed) two mandates and he already was an MK, he's succeeding in recruiting tens of thousands, so to tell a man like this to be in the sixth or seventh spot is not right," stressed Rabbi Ariel.

Emphasizing his point, the rabbi said "a person who brings tens of thousands of people, give him a place inside the first four spots. There is simple egoism and pettiness here, if (Yishai's party) doesn't get back its composure in the last minute and give a place for all the masses waiting for this unity between Eli Yishai and Ben-Ari, it will be a true danger to all of us."

[Kahane-Was-Right BT]

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/190538#.VMdpIdKUc1I 
Please Comment. Good? Bad? Neutral? Irrelevant?

Very interesting.  Sounds like Jewish Home has co-opted Feiglin's terminology and slogans.   

Probably a good development if the soccer player truly realizes how dumb he was before.  It will get bennett more votes from general israeli society since they love soccer.

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According to http://www.srugim.co.il/105987-%D7%90%D7%9C%D7%99-%D7%90%D7%95%D7%97%D7%A0%D7%94-%D7%A4%D7%95%D7%A8%D7%A9-%D7%9E%D7%94%D7%91%D7%99%D7%AA-%D7%94%D7%99%D7%94%D7%95%D7%93%D7%99
the soccer superstar Ohana has decided to give up on the offer to be a "Jewish Home" member of the Knesset given the large opposition to Bennett's choice of him to be up high up on the Knesset list.

[Zelhar]

Ayelet shaked said Ochana was selected to give more representation for mizrachim, but Irish jews are nor mizrachim ?!