Crisis over cuts to absorption budget averted - for now

Yesterday's coalition crisis lasted less than two hours, after Foreign Minister and Yisrael Beiteinu chairman Avigdor Lieberman threatened his party would not vote with the coalition in the Knesset if the cuts in the Immigrant Absorption Ministry budget were not canceled.

Lieberman was protesting that Yisrael Beiteinu, which counts immigrant absorption as a top priority, was being discriminated against, since proposed NIS 400 million cutbacks in yeshiva funding had already been taken off the table.

Less than an hour and a half later, Lieberman was invited to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office, and the crisis was declared over, after Netanyahu promised to correct the distortion and find a solution within a week.

Why did Lieberman choose to declare a crisis just then, only two hours after Netanyahu announced he he did not support the splitting of the attorney general's position, for now? Netanyahu's decision could have been interpreted as a sort of defeat for Lieberman, who is seen as allied with Justice Minister Yaakov Neeman and the fight against the "legal elites."

Lieberman ordered a special meeting of his Knesset faction and invited the media to an improvised press conference. Lieberman announced that "if by 4 P.M. we have not received a positive answer as to the cuts, we will not participate in any [Knesset] vote or support the government."

The common opinion among politicians was Lieberman was signaling Netanyahu on his disappointment, since up until that moment no one had heard about any such crisis or Lieberman's distress over the cuts in the immigration budget.

A Likud minister said, "Suddenly Lieberman discovered there was money lacking for immigrants, how come we never heard about it before? It is interesting that everything is a coincidence with him. By coincidence he called a press conference."

When asked about the relationship between the crisis and Netanyahu's decision on the attorney general post, Lieberman denied any such connection and even praised the prime minister's decision, saying Netanyahu made the only proper decision.

When pressed with more questions on the matter, Lieberman said impatiently that it did not matter what he did, people would still search for such a connection. He said there is no lack of liars, bastards and idiots here - and accused two people by name: Maariv reporter Shalom Yerushalmi and MK Shelly Yachimovich (Labor).

Yachimovich responded harshly to Lieberman's words.

"Lieberman, suspected of serious crimes, is furious and frustrated because his plots to weaken the position of attorney general and split [the position] were thwarted," she said.