Netanyahu offers Bennett a year as prime minister

In a last-ditch bid for a breakthrough, the day before his mandate for forming a government runs out, PM Binyamin Netanyahu on Monday offered Yamina leader Naftali Bennett the first year as premier in a right-wing government coalition. The post would then revert to Netanyahu. Other Yamna members would receive important posts, Netanyahu promised. The main thing is to prevent the formation of a left-wing government, he said. Bennett responded by saying that his goal was the survival of a right-wing government – not the premiership. Yamina is not the obstacle to that end, he said, but the Religious Zionist party’s Bezalel Smotrich.