"I am holding in my hand an unprecedented large sheaf of bills whose prime goal at the end of the day is to undermine Judaism in this State. The majority of these bills were passed mindlessly, not because the Likud suddenly decided that it is not the collective voice [Likud] of the people, the collective voice of preservers of tradition, the joint body of the public sector whose members have not forgotten their grandfather, even though they, personally, are not Torah observant. This government is altering time-worn traditions because this Likud is not acting like the party in power. They buy their coalitionary quiet via laws which undermine and attack every rabbinical institution and which negate everything that smacks of religion and halochoh."
These were the words spoken this past Monday in the Knesset plenum by MK Rabbi Yaakov Asher in presenting his no-confidence bill on behalf of UTJ.
Rabbi Asher stressed that according to all the actions of this government regarding religious matters relating to rabbinical batei din, it is apparent that all of the bureaucracy in this government is concentrated in this very place. "Was this your initial decision for this government term? To transform this country into a less religious one so that your coalition partners, who clutch you by the nape, will hopefully let you pass any bill that is more nationally inclined, a law that perhaps keep Israel more whole and intact, as concerns you so vitally? A `whole' Israel, complete and intact, is not a goal or ideal. It is only an ideal when its people are united and unique in a land which is united and unique. So you claim that you wish to preserve the wholeness of this land but if we lose our unique identity, it will no longer be Eretz Yisrael hasheleimah."
He mocked the way that decisions were arrived at in the government. Many are made under force and power tactics, mutual pressuring and extortion but not through any organized policy. "There is a feeling, perhaps something much stronger, a knowledge, of subterfugal dealings. Give me this law in exchange for religion. Give me that law in exchange for nationalism. Give me a law that will transform and attack the Jewish image of the State and I will approve some millions of shekalim in the Knesset financial committee for distant settlements which no one is aware of their existence and will not bother to ask if it is at all necessary. That's how things work. You manipulate matters according to your specific anti-religion, anti-traditional agendas in exchange for your games in political issues, in matters that are truly of life-and-death."
He continued to attack the Habayit Hayehudi party for its partnership in attacking every religious issue through legislation and said that "even the law of conversion, which has been put on hold, has not really been stopped in its tracks. I am sure that it will surface again in the near future, and will come in exchange for some budgetary allocation to a certain sector. I don't understand: Habayit Hayehudi which is ostensibly committed to preserving the structure of the rabbinate, of the dayanim, is part and parcel of this illicit wheeling-dealing. And these dealings translate to what Naftali Banet says to himself: I will sacrifice this in order to be able to pass a law against freeing terrorists or relinquishing land."
In conclusion, he related to the shameful law passed on Sunday in the legislative ministerial committee sanctioning euthanasia, and said that no one would have believed that such a law could have a chance in a ministerial committee. "Perhaps this is also a concession for something else... Perhaps it is a concession to the committee for security and foreign affairs.
"This government lacks any backbone. It is a government of survival alone, but this survival is demanding a high price. When the founder of the Likud, which was headed by Menachem Begin, looks down upon you from wherever he is now, you know as well as I that he is turning in the graves, from every possible aspect: from the aspect of compassion for the weaker levels of the population and also from the aspect of the religious nature of this State."
