Israeli Government Loses Majority as Backbencher Quits

Israel's Prime Minister Naftali Bennett speaks as he visits an army base in the Jewish settlement of Beit El, near Ramallah, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, April 5, 2022. (Reuters)
Israel's Prime Minister Naftali Bennett speaks as he visits an army base in the Jewish settlement of Beit El, near Ramallah, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, April 5, 2022. (Reuters)
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Israeli Government Loses Majority as Backbencher Quits

Israel's Prime Minister Naftali Bennett speaks as he visits an army base in the Jewish settlement of Beit El, near Ramallah, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, April 5, 2022. (Reuters)
Israel's Prime Minister Naftali Bennett speaks as he visits an army base in the Jewish settlement of Beit El, near Ramallah, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, April 5, 2022. (Reuters)

An Israeli lawmaker quit the government's wafer-thin ruling coalition over a religious dispute on Wednesday, throwing the fragile alliance into disarray without a majority in parliament.

Backbencher Idit Silman's departure raises the possibility of new parliamentary elections less than a year after the government took office. While Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s government remains in power, it is now hamstrung in the 120-seat parliament and will likely struggle to function.

Silman, from Bennett’s religious-nationalist Yamina party, had opposed the distribution of leavened bread and foodstuffs in public hospitals — in breach of religious tradition during the Passover holiday, public broadcaster Kan reported.

Bennett's coalition of eight political parties ranging from Islamists to hard-line nationalists and dovish liberals — all united solely in their opposition to former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu — now holds 60 seats in the Knesset, Israel's parliament.

The Knesset is currently in recess, and it remains unclear if the opposition will now have enough support to hold a no-confidence vote and send Israelis to the polls for the fifth time in just over three years.

Silman, said she “cannot lend a hand to harming the Jewish character of the state of Israel and the people of Israel,” and would work to form a right-wing government, Kan reported.

Israel has held four elections in two years in a protracted political crisis over Netanyahu's fitness to rule while on trial for corruption. The deadlocked elections were finally broken in June when Bennett and his allies ousted Netanyahu after 12 years in office by cobbling together a coalition of unlikely allies.

Netanyahu, now opposition leader, congratulated Silman and “welcomed her back home to the nationalist camp.”



Germany Arrests US Citizen over Accusations of Spying for China

The sun sets behind the buildings of the banking district in Frankfurt, Germany, Monday, Nov. 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Michael Probst)
The sun sets behind the buildings of the banking district in Frankfurt, Germany, Monday, Nov. 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Michael Probst)
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Germany Arrests US Citizen over Accusations of Spying for China

The sun sets behind the buildings of the banking district in Frankfurt, Germany, Monday, Nov. 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Michael Probst)
The sun sets behind the buildings of the banking district in Frankfurt, Germany, Monday, Nov. 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Michael Probst)

Germany’s federal prosecutor office said it arrested an American citizen on Thursday who allegedly spied for China, The Associated Press reported.
The office said that the suspect, who was only identified as Martin D., was arrested in Frankfurt and that his home was being searched.
The accused, who until recently worked for the US Armed Forces in Germany, is strongly suspected of having agreed to act as an intelligence agent for a foreign secret service, the statement said.
Earlier this year, he contacted Chinese government agencies and offered to transmit sensitive information from the US military to a Chinese intelligence service, according to an investigation by Germany’s domestic intelligence service.
He had obtained the information in question in the course of his work in the US army, the prosecutor’s statement said, without giving any further information.
German investigators have exposed several people suspected of spying for China this year.
Last month, German authorities arrested a Chinese national accused of passing information on a major air freight hub to a man who is suspected of spying for China.
And in April, a man who worked for a prominent German far-right lawmaker in the European Parliament was arrested on suspicion of spying for China.