Former Prime Minister Yair Lapid laid out six foreign policy priorities for a future Together (B\u2019Yachad) government at the party\u2019s National Security Conference in Tel Aviv on Wednesday, arguing that Israel can reverse its deteriorating international position by rebuilding alliances and restoring a coherent diplomatic strategy.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThis diplomatic crisis was created not only because of the circumstances\u2013but because of the negligence, arrogance, and amateurism of this Israeli government,\u201d Lapid said Wednesday. He described foreign relations as inseparable from national security and essential to Israel\u2019s military, technological and economic strength.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Lapid placed repairing relations with the United States first, calling for Israel to restore bipartisan support and strengthen ties with constituencies ranging from young Americans to liberal Jewish communities. He rejected giving up on the US-Israel security memorandum of understanding.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe MOU must not be given up on. It must be fought for. Giving up on it is a serious mistake by Netanyahu,\u201d Lapid said, proposing both a new security MOU and a separate scientific-technological agreement covering areas including nuclear energy, quantum technology and chips.\u00a0<\/p>\n
His second priority was Europe, where he advocated rebuilding relations with the European Union, deepening NATO ties and engaging with hostile public opinion in Spain, France and Ireland rather than withdrawing diplomatically.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Lapid identified repairing ties with Diaspora Jewry as the third goal, calling world Jewry \u201cour family\u201d as well as a strategic asset.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Regional integration came fourth. Lapid identified Egypt and the United Arab Emirates as key partners and said normalization with Saudi Arabia should be pursued while preventing uranium enrichment on Saudi soil \u201cat all costs.\u201d He also called for Qatar to be designated an enemy state, accusing it of supporting Hamas and financing efforts to delegitimize Israel.\u00a0<\/p>\n
On Turkey, Lapid said Ankara poses a threat, particularly in Syria, and called Monday night\u2019s Israeli strike on a Syrian airport justified. But he argued Israel should attempt to reduce tensions before entering a direct confrontation with a regional power and establish a mechanism to manage potential conflicts.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Lapid\u2019s fifth objective was integrating economic and foreign policy, including coordinated government efforts to expand opportunities for Israeli high-tech and defense industries.\u00a0<\/p>\n
His final priority was rebuilding Israel\u2019s public diplomacy operation for younger and social-media audiences.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cMuch more Noa Tishby, much less Orit Strock,\u201d Lapid said.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Prime Minister Yair Lapid laid out six foreign policy priorities for a future Together (B\u2019Yachad) government at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":590453,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[85,46,43],"class_list":["post-590452","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-israel","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/590452","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=590452"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/590452\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/590453"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=590452"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=590452"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=590452"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}