Israel's parliament votes to dissolve itself and set March 17 election
Mon Dec 8, 2014 8:27pm GMT
* Netanyahu pledges food price cuts
* Lawmakers vote to keep migrants in detention
By Allyn Fisher-Ilan
JERUSALEM, Dec 8 (Reuters) - Israel's parliament voted on Monday to dissolve
itself in preparation for an early general election on March 17, after a
crisis set in motion by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's dismissal of two
ministers.
The parliament's vote of 93 to 0 formalised a decision to move forward an
election that had not been expected until 2017, in the aftermath of
Netanyahu's Dec. 2 firing of Yair Lapid as finance minister and Tzipi Livni
as justice minister.
Most opinion polls show Netanyahu being reelected as prime minister, with
many Israelis backing his tough stance on the conflict with the Palestinians
and other security issues.
Though his Likud party is expected to win the most seats, Netanyahu would
need to align with other parties to form a government with majority support
in the 120-member parliament.
Netanyahu launched his re-election campaign on Monday with a promise to
cancel value added tax on basic foods, at a business conference in Tel Aviv.
He called the plan a blueprint for "social justice", in what was seen as a
critical nod to middle-class Israelis and ultra-Orthodox parties whose
support he may need to head the next government.
Just before the dissolution vote, lawmakers voted 47 to 23 to pass a
government-backed amendment to keep open a detention centre for African
migrants despite a high court order to shut it by Dec. 22.
The court found in September that holding some 2,000 migrants, under a law
passed in 2013 that permitted them to be held without trial, violated rights
to freedom and dignity.
The amendment passed on Tuesday set a 20-month limit to detentions at the
Holot facility.
More than 40,000 Eritreans and Sudanese are in Israel, human rights groups
say. Many entered illegally across the border with Egypt.
"In a democracy you cannot jail people without trial. The court will reject
it, again," lawmaker Nitzan Horowitz of the left-wing Meretz party said, in
protest against the vote.
Hotline for Refugees and Migrants, an advocacy group for the migrants, said
it would appeal again to the court, saying parliament had voted "to waste
taxpayers' money on wrong solutions." (Writing by Allyn Fisher-Ilan; editing
by Andrew Roche)