Amid a cluster of crises, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and Alternate Prime Minister Yair Lapid are focused on Sunday, when the Jerusalem Day flag march is scheduled to proceed, despite the conflict over it.
Follow Israel Hayom on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram
The coalition understands that given the political instability, the last thing it needs is for the march to get out of control and develop into a security situation that would further jeopardize the coalition – with emphasis on the Ra'am party and MK Ghaida Rinawie Zoabi, who was recently brought back to its ranks.
Tens of thousands of Israelis are expected to take part in the march.
Ahead of the march, MK Mazen Ghanem told Israel Hayom, "If they go into the Muslim Quarter, it will be a provocation. They aren't going to throw flowers at the residents of Jerusalem, but to incite and yell. So I would expect the prime minister and the public security minister to not allow them in there, in order to avoid that friction.
"But apparently, it's [far-right MK Itamar] Ben-Gvir who will ultimately make the decision, not the Israeli government. We are praying that nothing will happen. There is no one who isn't worrying about it," Ghanem said.
The main concern is about an incident like the one that took place on Jerusalem Day in 2021, when Hamas responded to the march by firing rockets at Israel from Gaza. The coalition understands that if the security situation were to take a major turn for the worse, not all Ra'am MKs will remain.
To reduce the pressure surrounding the flag march, the government has taken action on a few fronts – starting with sending a message to Ra'am MKs to dial down their rhetoric on the matter.
Bennett and Public Security Minister Omer Barlev also placed importance on a preemptive decision that the flag march would go by Damascus Gate as originally planned, explaining that a decision was taken to seek a consensus on the route based on advice from experts.
"The fact that we issued a message to the public ahead of time about the route burst the bubble of pressure surrounding the event and prevented needless tension and fake news," government officials said.
Sources in the government said that another way of avoiding possible escalation is through public outreach, with Israeli officials mediating between foreign news outlets and diplomatics. The police also set up a special situation room to handle that aspect of the march.
"Al Jazeera is dispatching extra personnel, Hamas is trying to stir things up around the Temple Mount, and in our outreach and rejection of fake news we need to separate Damascus Gate from the Temple Mount," police said.
US Ambassador to Israel Tom Nides has met with Barlev and expressed concern over possible escalation of tensions after the march. Barlev told him: "My father gave the order to liberate Jerusalem, it's our capital."
Subscribe to Israel Hayom's daily newsletter and never miss our top stories!
Despite the growing threats from various Palestinian groups, Israel's political leadership has decided that the route of the march will include Damascus Gate. Meanwhile, thousands of police officers have been deployed to Jerusalem, and they will be backed up by two Border Police companies transferred temporarily from Judea and Samaria.
This is the first time since Operation Guardian of the Walls in May 2021 that the IDF has acquiesced to Israel Police requests to transfer Border Police personnel to Jerusalem to shore up the regular police forces in the city.
A senior government official told Israel Hayom that "The government policy is not to buckle to any threat by terrorist organizations."
The same official noted that last year, then-Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu diverted the march away from Damascus Gate because of intelligence that Hamas would fire rockets. "The decision didn't pay off, because even without [the march] passing Damascus Gate, Hamas fired rockets at Israel," he said.
After a general meeting of the Palestinian groups in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, a state of "enlistment" was announced, with the groups calling on the public in Gaza to "prepare to defend the holy sites, stand up to Zionist aggression, and take to the streets and wave Palestinian flags and engage with the enemy at flash points."
"We warn the Zionist enemy against doing anything foolish that will allow the flag march to invade Al-Aqsa, and underscore that this plan will be a powder keg that will blow up the entire region. Jerusalem and the holy sites are a red line, and our people, with all their power and resistance, will not sit idly by and will work to repel the Zionist aggressive in any way possible," the Gaza groups said.
