_a.jpg "Photo: Yaron Brenner")
Netanyahu attacks ‘champion of strikes’ Peretz
Former finance minister, Labor leader trade fire over economic policies
Israel is a world champion in strikes thanks to Amir Peretz, who is the world champion of strikes, former Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the Israel Business Conference on Sunday.
Israel Business Conference (Footage: Yaron Brenner)
“The monopolies, pensions, and high taxes brought us close to bankruptcy before I entered my role (as finance minister), said Netanyahu.
As planned beforehand, Netanyahu left the forum immediately after finishing his speech so as to avoid a direct confrontation with Labor Party Chairman Amir Peretz. Netanyahu exited the hall minutes before Peretz’s arrival.
The Labor party head fired back at Netanyahu, saying: “It’s wrong to catch a person during his weak point. It was Bibi who benefited from all of the strikes, and it was I who lost out from them.”
‘Wave of populism washing the country’
During his speech, Netanyahu said: “There’s a wave of populism washing the country. Everyone is busy explaining why they are more socially oriented than the other, and how they will fill the register, without explaining how they will do so, and how it has been filled in the last two years.”
“Two and a half years ago we stood near an abyss, and that’s why we didn’t know why we were next to an abyss. There were three hundred thousand unemployed people, and if we wouldn’t have changed our policies, there would have been half a million," said Netanyahu.
"The governor of the Bank of Israel warned of the Bank collapsing. If the Bank would have crashed, the wealthy would have been fine, but what would the poor have done? They would have been standing in the street and no one would be receiving any sort of pension. The pensions situation reached an absurd level, in which they were being distributed at the expense of those who were really needy, and to finance that, we applied the highest taxes in the world, causing factories to have trouble competing,” he added.
Netanyahu said that if he would regain control of the economy, he would privatize military industry, and complete reforms in the electricity sector, among other goals.
Peretz, for his part, said: “It was me who lost out in the strikes and Bibi who gained. Take, for example, the massive ports strike. The best strike is the one that never happened. Every strike is a (result of a) failure of the Finance Ministry and of the Histradrut.”
