The outpost arrangement bill could not have legally saved Ulpana, but the Right had nothing else to hold onto • Minister Without Portfolio Ze´ev Binyamin (Benny) Begin and Vice Prime Minister Moshe (Bogie) Ya´alon tried to argue that the bill would harm the settlement enterprise, but now it looks like they themselves are suffering the harm.

Even after his sweeping triumph in the Knesset in torpedoing the outpost arrangement bill, and even after successfully eliminating every last pocket of dissent in the government with one quick threat that any minister voting in favor of the bill would be fired, the joy of victory was not apparent on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu´s face when he left the voting hall on Wednesday. After the vote, several Likud ministers, along with Kadima and Labor members, rushed to shake the prime minister´s hand and commend him on his display of leadership. But the wave of congratulations was not enough to erase the grave expression from Netanyahu´s face.

Netanyahu knows that this political victory could turn into a brand new challenge in a matter of months. He knows that many of the politicians and political commentators who lavished praise on him this week all wish him ill during the other 51 weeks of the year.

Even though it encompasses only five buildings, the evacuation of the disputed homes in the Ulpana neighborhood of Beit El is not something that should be taken lightly. In the 2006 evacuation of the outpost of Amona — where a clash between settlers and security forces left hundreds injured, leaving a lingering scar on the nation — only nine families were evacuated. There are 30 families currently residing in the disputed Ulpana homes. Everyone remembers how Amona ended up and no one wants to see it reprised. Least of all Netanyahu.

The prime minister poured all of his resources into preventing the outpost arrangement bill, which would have prevented the Ulpana evacuation, from becoming law. But he never concealed his personal objection to the evacuation. After the bill was voted down by the Knesset, several settler leaders and rightists conceded that even had it passed, it would most likely not even have been legally applicable to Ulpana (only to future disputes) but they supported the bill because they felt that they had nothing else to hold on to.

The preparations for the evacuation officially began this week, but behind the scenes there are still active efforts to prevent or delay the eviction of families, and more importantly, the demolition of the homes. Netanyahu is involved in every one of these backstage efforts, and has been trying, together with Justice Minister Yaakov Neeman, Attorney-General Yehuda Weinstein and cabinet ministers Ehud Barak and Moshe (Bogie) Ya´alon, to come up with a last minute solution that would prevent the evacuation. The likelihood of their success is difficult to assess at this point.

The Knesset members belonging to the right-most end of the Likud could not believe how quickly their minister friends had relinquished their ideals (many ministers who promised to vote in favor of the outpost arrangement bill ended up voting against it due to Netanyahu´s threat that he would immediately dismiss any minister who defied him). For years they have been hearing their leftist rivals float horror theories about the radical right-wingers (headed by Likud member Moshe Feiglin and dubbed the Feiglinites) who have taken control over the Likud and have the prime minister wrapped around their finger. They´ve been hearing stories of the handful of loudmouthed rightists that wreaked havoc during the latest Likud Convention, portraying these troublemakers as a group of hilltop settler youth that have wrestled control over the Likud´s main governing body. But lo and behold, Netanyahu flexes one muscle and they all crawl back into their holes. Even their representatives in the government stood cowering in fear behind the leader of the country.

Likud ministers Limor Livnat, Yisrael Katz, Gilad Erdan and Gideon Sa´ar — everyone fell in line. After the vote, some of them ridiculed Likud ministers Yuli Edelstein and Gila Gamliel who, up until the very last minute, declared that they would support the bill even at the risk of being removed from their posts, but by the time the vote came around had reconsidered their principled positions. Ridiculing them is no big achievement. True, they caved, but only after realizing that they had been completely abandoned. The entire right wing collapsed. Even Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman and Ya´alon, who vocally supported the bill, voted against it in the end. Gamliel´s and Edelstein´s associates retorted: What were they expected to do?

Danny Danon, one of the leaders of the rightist camp within the Likud, has a different take on the situation. He explained that the Likud´s rightist camp numbers about 10,000 people at most, and that they were divided into four or five central groups. "Several days before the vote, we gathered everyone and announced that we wouldn´t support anyone who voted against the bill. It didn´t work with the ministers, but it worked with the MKs. All the Likud MKs, with the exception of Carmel Shama Hacohen, voted in favor," Danon said.

Danon explained further that what happened in the Likud was a direct result of Kadima´s entry into the coalition last month. "General elections are once again far off, and the ministers feel more committed to the prime minister, assuming that they have enough time to repair the impression they created with this vote. If we were in the midst of an election year, not only the ministers but also the prime minister would have done everything in their power to prevent the demolition of the [Ulpana] buildings," he said.

One tear that will not be easily repaired is the one that put Netanyahu and the chairman of his Likud faction, MK Zeev Elkin, on opposing sides of the issue. Elkin not only supported the outpost arrangement bill, he also made active efforts to recruit a majority for its approval. Elkin has been absent from the Likud´s ministerial meetings this week, and a private meeting scheduled for Monday between him and Netanyahu was cancelled at the last minute. However, it is doubtful that Netanyahu will try to replace Elkin as faction chair, as this would require a secret Likud ballot. The only relevant candidate to take Elkin´s place — MK Ofir Akunis — has already graciously declined.

During the Likud´s last election campaign, following the 2008-2009 Israeli military offensive in Gaza when Israelis´ votes were migrating rightward, Netanyahu arrived one day at the photographers studio, put Benny Begin on his right and Ya´alon on his left and flooded the country with campaign posters. The aim of that poster was to show the people of Israel that the real rightists, the ones that love and cherish the land, are in the Likud. A year after he was elected, Netanyahu once again required the assistance of these two ministers to get the settlement construction moratorium approved.

Those days are gone. Begin was the first to get burned. The admiration that he enjoyed only three years ago has been recently replaced with anger, and even with a certain degree of hatred. The uncompromising manner in which he has defended the decisions of the High Court of Justice, and his decisive objection to certain controversial legislation efforts — like the bill seeking to limit the funding of left-wing nongovernmental organizations, or the bill seeking to alter the makeup of the Judicial Selection committee, and others — have turned Begin into a Trojan horse in the eyes of many Likud members, a truly foreign element.

Now it is Ya´alon´s turn. His objection to the outpost arrangement bill helped the prime minister soften the stances of many of the other Likud ministers, like Erdan, Moshe Kahlon, Sa´ar and Livnat. But Ya´alon´s status will never be what it once was.

Ya´alon is seen as the undisputed leader of the Likud´s rightist camp. As such, he could easily take the party reins, nearly unopposed, after Netanyahu steps down. To a certain degree, Ya´alon could even serve as a formidable alternative to Netanyahu should the prime minister decide to foment some sort of political big bang and split from the Likud. In such a scenario, Ya´alon would be Netanyahu´s natural successor, if he decided to remain in the party.

But now, after this last week, it is no longer so black and white. The rightist camp is indescribably angry with him. Their disappointment is immense. For quite some time, the general feeling in the Likud has been that Ya´alon decided to switch sides and that he has grown tired of being the representative of the Right within the party. Perhaps he feels that this role will ultimately hurt him. Several weeks ago, when he spoke out in favor of same-sex marriage, he began raising some concern.

Ya´alon´s associates deny this as pure speculation. Ya´alon is only expressing his views, they insist, on the issue of same sex marriage, as on the issue of the outpost arrangement bill. They maintain that Ya´alon is pro-settlement, but feels that the outpost arrangement bill would only harm the settlement enterprise. "Anyone who has discussed the issue with Ya´alon, including the most senior members of the Yesha settler council, eventually agreed with him," one of his associates said.

Ramon´s prophecy

One of this week´s biggest winners is undoubtedly Kadima Chairman Shaul Mofaz. After Haim Ramon announced that he was quitting Kadima due to Mofaz´s decision to join Netanyahu´s coalition, the former minister, along with his can of worms in the form of a sex crime conviction, launched earnest efforts to split Kadima. His aim is to one day join the Kadima refugees with former Kadima Chairwoman Tzipi Livni or political hopeful Yair Lapid. Ramon´s efforts to lure various Kadima MKs to leave the party touched on the outpost arrangement bill, among other things.

"Ultimately, Netanyahu will cave in to right-wing pressure from within his party, and from Lieberman, and support the bill," Ramon prophesied to his targets. "You will be forced to support it too."

Some of the MKs he approached were not quick to buy into Ramon´s projection. "You don´t believe me? See for yourselves," he said decisively, adding that "this will also be the fate of the Tal Law." Mofaz´s camp didn´t expect such a political windfall so soon after joining the coalition.

Mofaz´s office waited with anticipation, and much trepidation, to see how the four Likud ministers who promised to support the bill would behave. A vote in favor would have brought about immediate dismissal. Since Kadima joined the coalition, its members have felt that everything was much too fragile - one wrong move and everything would fall apart. The polls were unfavorable, Livni was breathing down their necks, and talk of Kadima possibly merging with the Likud didn´t bode well for them either. The last thing that Mofaz needs is battles over ministerial portfolios in his party. The dismissal of Likud ministers would have surely resulted in precisely that.

Now he can breathe easy, but not for long. At the end of July, after the Plesner committee completes the task of formulating an alternative to the Tal Law (a law that essentially legally exempts ultra-Orthodox Jews from mandatory military service, which was ruled unconstitutional by the High Court). That is when Kadima is scheduled to be bestowed with three or four ministerial appointments. The war that will likely erupt as a result is going to make Mofaz miss his days fighting wars as an Israel Defense Forces commander, as the IDF chief of general staff and as defense minister.

Life is discovered on Facebook

There are two Kadima members who are not currently serving in the Knesset, but have big plans for when they do, and are maintaining very involved Facebook campaigns. The first one is Tzachi Hanegbi. Hanegbi recently discovered the world of social networking, and he has become very prolific in updating his friends with his thoughts and insights. He even recently launched a website carrying his name. These tools were supposed to help him in his quest to get elected to the Kadima Knesset list in the primaries that were supposed to be held in two weeks. But now they have become the tools that will enable his political comeback, either as a minister in the current government or, again, in future primaries, whenever they may be held. His first choice is to rejoin Kadima, but if that proves impossible, he has not ruled out joining Likud, which he originally left to join Kadima.

Hanegbi doesn’t know how welcome he would be in a party that he left six years ago. He no longer knows any of the members of the party´s central committee, but he has always maintained close ties with dozens, and possibly even hundreds, of key Likud figures, and he has not spoken ill of the party, or of Netanyahu, since he left. In that respect, he could certainly be welcome back into the Likud fold.

The second Kadima member is Livni. If anyone had any doubts regarding her intentions of returning to the political arena, this week dispelled those doubts. After publicly praising the Madonna performance in Tel Aviv, she segued into a wistful description of an article by renowned Israeli author Yoram Kaniuk. An uninspired, whiny article that she described as follows: "Kaniuk wrote an article about an end, but we will create a new beginning."