{"id":70234,"date":"2022-11-03T16:56:07","date_gmt":"2022-11-03T21:56:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/?p=70234"},"modified":"2022-11-03T16:56:07","modified_gmt":"2022-11-03T21:56:07","slug":"lapid-concedes-to-netanyahu-prepares-to-hand-over-reins-of-government","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/lapid-concedes-to-netanyahu-prepares-to-hand-over-reins-of-government\/","title":{"rendered":"Lapid concedes to Netanyahu, prepares to hand over reins of government"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By RON KAMPEAS<\/p>\n<p>(JTA) \u2014 Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid called his rival, former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, to concede this week\u2019s election as most of the votes were counted by the end of Thursday.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_70235\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/11-03-2022-Netanyahu.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-70235\" class=\"wp-image-70235 size-medium lazyload\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/11-03-2022-Netanyahu-300x169.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"169\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/11-03-2022-Netanyahu-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/11-03-2022-Netanyahu-1024x578.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/11-03-2022-Netanyahu-768x433.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/11-03-2022-Netanyahu-1536x867.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/11-03-2022-Netanyahu-2048x1156.jpg 2048w\" data-sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 300px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 300\/169;\" \/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-70235\" class=\"wp-image-70235 size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/11-03-2022-Netanyahu-300x169.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"169\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/11-03-2022-Netanyahu-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/11-03-2022-Netanyahu-1024x578.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/11-03-2022-Netanyahu-768x433.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/11-03-2022-Netanyahu-1536x867.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/11-03-2022-Netanyahu-2048x1156.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/noscript><\/a><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-70235\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and wife Sara Netanyahu greet supporters at an election night event for the Likud party, Nov. 1, 2022. (Amir Levy\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>\u201cThe State of Israel is above any political consideration. I wish Netanyahu luck for the sake of the people of Israel and the State of Israel,\u201d Lapid wrote in a statement.<\/p>\n<p>Netanyahu, meantime, has launched the negotiating process to form the next government with the far-right Religious Zionist party and haredi Orthodox parties. With a total of 64 seats, Netanyahu\u2019s bloc surpassed poll predictions.<\/p>\n<p>Amid rumors that President Joe Biden\u2019s administration might not engage with Itamar Ben-Gvir, one of the Religious Zionist leaders who will likely be given a cabinet position, U.S. Ambassador to Israel Tom Nides called Netanyahu to congratulate him on Thursday.<\/p>\n<p>U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price had been less direct on Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe hope that all Israeli government officials will continue to share the values of an open, democratic society including tolerance and respect for all in civil society, particularly for minority groups,\u201d Price told reporters.<\/p>\n<p>Ben-Gvir \u2014 who has said he prefers to be public security minister, which controls Israel\u2019s police \u2014 has worried U.S. leaders with his extremist rhetoric about the use of police force against Arabs and his calls to expel people who are not loyal to Israel.<\/p>\n<p>An array of international leaders began to congratulate Netanyahu on Thursday, including Viktor Orban, the far-right president of Hungary, and Giorgia Meloni, the right-wing prime minister of Italy. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who has criticized Israel\u2019s unwillingness to supply Ukraine with weapons in its war with Ukraine, also sent congratulations. \u201cWe hope to open a new page in cooperation with the new Government for &amp; benefit!\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n<div style=\"padding-bottom:20px; padding-top:10px;\" class=\"hupso-share-buttons\"><!-- Hupso Share Buttons - https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/ --><a class=\"hupso_toolbar\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" data-src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" class=\"lazyload\" \/><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\"\/><\/noscript><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">var hupso_services_t=new Array(\"Twitter\",\"Facebook\",\"Google Plus\",\"Pinterest\",\"Linkedin\",\"Tumblr\",\"Email\");var hupso_background_t=\"#EAF4FF\";var hupso_border_t=\"#66CCFF\";var hupso_toolbar_size_t=\"medium\";var hupso_image_folder_url = \"\";var hupso_url_t=\"\";var hupso_title_t=\"Lapid%20concedes%20to%20Netanyahu%2C%20prepares%20to%20hand%20over%20reins%20of%20government\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/js\/share_toolbar.js\"><\/script><!-- Hupso Share Buttons --><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":70235,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,27,1794],"tags":[208,8790,8795,8788,2272],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70234"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70234"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70234\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":70236,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70234\/revisions\/70236"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70235"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70234"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70234"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70234"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}