Yair Lapid on the Future of Israeli Politics

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: What do you think has changed, if anything, to give you any confidence of doing anything better the next time around in September?

LAPID: Well, politics and confidence doesn’t often come together. But we feel good about our chances, mainly due to the fact that Netanyahu ran on the election three months ago, a couple of months ago, telling everybody that the main thing is policy and politics and he’s not going to demand immunity from his future partners. And then he went into negotiating a new government and the only thing he’s been asking for was immunity. And the voters were disappointed and angry, his voters. And I think they are still disappointed and angry because this is not a platform to run on in a country as complicated and that faces as many challenges as Israel. So, I think there is a change — there’s a shift in the way the Likud voters, his voters are looking at him, and for our votes as even — became even more determined to — that it’s time for a change. So, yes, I think we have a fair chance of changing the government in September the 17.

AMANPOUR: So, we’ve seen over the last — I mean, we’ve said, he’s now, this weekend, becoming the longest serving prime minister since the great Ben-Gurion and we’ve seen that he’s a survivor, he’s a wiley and canny political operative and he, you know, as I said, has many, many tricks up his sleeve to win often. When you say immunity, let’s just be clear about what you’re talking about, he is trying to get his partners to guarantee that what, that they won’t allow the attorney general to indict him? I mean, the attorney general seems to be deciding and weighing up whether in fact do that, but that would come after an election anyway.

LAPID: Yes. Well, you’re putting me in a corner here, which is what you do, and it’s fine. Because, you know, from previous talks we had, I made it into a rule not to attack the prime minister in foreign press. So, I will just say the following. Netanyahu is looking for an immunity bill, especially immunity bill which will make it almost impossible to indict him. This is, of course, stands against the basic democratic rule of everybody is equal in face of the law. So, we were very much against it. We’ve demonstrated against it. And unfortunately, it didn’t happen because he couldn’t form a government. And I think there is the possibility now it’s too late because his hearing and then the indictment is coming in October, whatever the results will be.