Moreover, this is the only job in which you cannot fail. Since foreign policy is largely determined and conducted by the Prime Minister, the Foreign Minister is not blamed for anything, unless he is a perfect fool -- and you certainly are not that.
After four years, everybody will be convinced that you are prime ministerial material.
Even better: you can dictate the immediate opening of peace talks with the Palestinians. Netanyahu is in no position to refuse, particularly as Barak Obama will demand the same. The opening ceremony of the negotiations will be a triumph for you. Actual progress will be neither demanded nor expected.
SO WHY not take it?
Because you see a big warning sign.
The 543,289 citizens who voted for you did not vote for a foreign minister. They voted for making the Orthodox serve in the army, providing affordable housing, getting food prices down, lowering taxes on the Middle Class. They don't give a damn about foreign relations, the occupation, peace and such trivia.
If you evade these domestic problems and go to the foreign office, a deafening cry will be taken up: Traitor! Deserter! Cheat!
Half of your followers will leave you at once. For them, your name will be mud.
Moreover, in order to follow a peace agenda, even pro forma, you must discard the idea of having Naftali Bennett's ultra-rightist party in the coalition, and take in the Orthodox parties instead. If so, how to compel the Orthodox to serve in the army, akin to feeding them pork?
THE LOGICAL conclusion: you must choose the treasury.
God forbid!!!
I would not wish this fate on the worst of my enemies, and I feel no enmity towards the son of Tommy Lapid.
The next Finance Minister will be compelled to do exactly the opposite of Ya'ir's election promises.
His first task concerns the state budget for 2013, already overdue. According to official figures, there is a hole of 39 billion Shekels, something like 10 billion dollars. Where will they come from?
The real alternatives are few, and all are painful. There must be heavy new taxes, especially on the glorified Middle Class and the poor. Lapid, a neo-liberal like Netanyahu, will not tax the rich.
Then there will be sweeping cuts in government services, such as education, health and the welfare state. At the moment, hospitals are working at 140% capacity, endangering the lives of patients. Many schools are falling apart. Lower pensions will spell misery for the old, the disabled and the unemployed. Everybody will curse the Finance Minister. Is this how you want to launch your political career?
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