Moshe Feiglin: As Long as the Right Offers no Alternative, the Left's Policies will Rule

Excerpts from an interview with Moshe Feiglin

on Radio Kol B'ramah 18 Shvat 5777/Feb. 14, '17'

We are hearing very significant encouragement coming from the Likud for the Prime Minister to build more in Judea and Samaria. Is it possible that we are witnessing a momentum of political change, from Netanyahu's point of view?

MF: Based on my acquaintance with the history of the Israeli Right in general and of Netanyahu in particular, I see very great danger. I see exactly the opposite. I see a reality that to my great sorrow, I predicted, and so, with all due modesty, I feel secure with what I'm saying. I see a reality that is very, very reminiscent of Sharon and Gush Katif. In other words, I see an Israeli Prime Minister from the Likud, once again from the Likud, under investigations, under great pressure in Israel. I see a very strong President in the United States, with an Israeli Prime Minister who is manipulating him back to the reality we had with Obama. Netanyahu caused the embassy not to be moved to Jerusalem and announced even before Trump was inaugurated that he is in favor of the two state solution. His Defense Minister says that we won't build outside of the settlement blocs. He is changing the tone and the praises that we heard at the beginning of the road from President Trump. And now, he's flying to the United States, when in the background, as far as can be seen, a regional peace conference is cooking. An additional problem that didn't exist at the time of Sharon is the involvement of the Russians, who are right up on Israel's northern border and the warming relations between the US and Russia.

Maybe this is an explanation, Moshe Feiglin, for the position of the Prime Minister. Perhaps he understands that the Arab world that is very dominant and the Europeans are watching every one of our steps - not with a fond eye - and therefore the Prime Minister is navigating, as he says, between all these drops. Maybe we can rely on him as someone who will really navigate between this whole sea of roadblocks.

MF:You know, Yehuda, someone who has been scalded with boiling water is wary even with cold water. We've been scalded several times by leaders of the Likud, starting with Begin and the Sinai, continuing with Sharon and the Disengagement. Netanyahu himself has already agreed in the past to retreat from the whole of the Golan and to give it to Assad, up to 10 meters from the Kinneret. Netanyahu himself has already given away 93-94% of the city of Hebron. Netanyahu and his entire government destroyed a whole settlement just a couple of weeks ago, let's not forget that. So we find ourselves in a situation in which the same Netanyahu, under pressure from investigations, will certainly be happy to be protected the way the media protected Sharon. The same Netanyahu, exactly, is going to a meeting where he's told us in advance what he wants to talk about. He wants to talk about the two state solution. Putin, as far as can be seen, is going to be an additional sponsor of the peace conference, since he is already present in our region. In other words, the Golan Heights will also be in great danger. We continually find ourselves in this reality with the leaders of the right wing in the Likud.

And with all that, the Prime Minister is saying, "I will protect the settlements". No settlement has been evacuated, at least not for diplomatic reasons. Construction, at least in the settlement blocs, continues, and that's under eight very hostile years from the American government, to say nothing of Europe.

MF: Okay, I want to remind you that in all the examples that I brought before, there was no problem of a hostile government and no problem of American pressure. The international situation of the State of Israel today is much more comfortable. It is specifically in a reality like this that Israeli Prime Ministers become like Sharon. Sharon didn't evacuate any settlements before he expelled all of Gush Katif. And he even said before that that what applied to Netzarim in Gush Katif also applied to Tel Aviv. Ladies and gentlemen, the time has come for the Israeli Right to stop blindly following leaders who talk out of both sides of their mouths. They tell the Right what they want to hear, but in their actions and hints to the Americans, the international community and our Arab neighbors they do just the opposite.

Yesterday I heard quotes from Likud members, very senior ministers in the party, who all gathered in the Knesset on the backdrop of the expected Trump-Netanyahu meeting, and said things that were very clear, both on the construction that needs to happen in Judea and Samaria and on thwarting the possibility of a Palestinian State. And the one who specifically stands at the head of the Likud expresses an entirely different line. How does this happen? What makes the leader - who has the entire party under him, the platform and the voters who voted for that platform - conduct the state in clear opposition to the views of his party and voter base?

MF: I'm very happy that you asked that question, Yehuda, because we need to understand this issue at its source. This isn't a personal issue. We should not think that Begin was weak, and Sharon was I don't know what, and Netanyahu robs his voters. This is a systemic issue. I'm strengthening what you said. Even those who come out against Netanyahu and say, "We have to settle!", and so on and so forth, when one of them, God forbid, will replace Netanyahu, and it doesn't matter right now who that will be, he will act exactly like him. So once and for all we need to understand the mechanism that causes us to always elect the right wing but get the left wing.   The mechanism is very simple. The Right, the entire Right, the religious and the non-religious, the whole National Camp, upon all its branches, has never, never presented a clear strategy, a clear vision, a clear objective, against the two state idea of Oslo. Never. When Shimon Peres asked the head of the opposition, Binyamin Netanyahu, "What is your alternative?" Binyamin Netanyahu didn't answer. And he hasn't answered up to today, and no one has answered. The only party that is finally answering what we want, not what they don't do, but what we do, is the Zehut Party under my leadership.

There's also the Jewish Home, who say that we need to annex, or sovereignty...

MF: I absolutely disagree with you. The Jewish Home does not say anything. It scatters all sorts of impressions, as if they have a statement about some sort of ethereal annexation, which will never happen. They have no organized program or clear objective that says what we want to see at the end of the movie. Nothing. Not a thing. The Left says exactly what it wants, and therefore the moment it has the opportunity... when Rabin rose to power, he immediately implemented his policies. The Right does not say anything and therefore adopts the same two state solution.

And you will propose a change, and turn to the voters in the coming elections?

MF: I won't just propose. I've already proposed. In a lengthy, well formulated, platform of hundreds of pages, which will be presented at our convention on 2 Adar, on the 28th of February, in another 2 weeks, at Hanger 11 in Tel Aviv, to everyone who comes and listens. Members of the party and those who are interested, everyone who comes on Tuesday night to Hanger 11 will be able to know exactly what we are proposing.  So long as the national camp has no alternative to the Left, whoever stands at its head will fulfill the only vision that is available: the vision of the Left.