He is well aware that such a government will generate enormous resentment from Israelis elsewhere on the political spectrum for entrenching the exclusion of ultra-Orthodox youth from military service and subsidizing full-time Haredi Torah study and large families at taxpayer expense. It will depend on ideological hardliners constantly pushing for more aggressive policies toward the Palestinians, potentially sparking deeper military confrontations. It will want to avoid causing despair or even exodus of Israelis who see no place for themselves in a country ruled by a coalition so at odds with their approaches to Judaism and democracy, and therefore are unwilling to serve or send their children to serve in its army. In at least some areas, he would prefer not to advance policies that risk deeply damaging Israeli ties with the Diaspora and key allies, undermining diplomatic support, hurting the economy and provoking new heights of international criticism. Get The Times of Israel Daily Edition by email and never miss our top stories By signing up, you agree to the terms Netanyahu, remember, is no military adventurer. Unlike an overwhelming percentage of incoming MKs from his bloc, he served in the IDF – served heroically – and knows firsthand the cost of war and conflict with the death of his beloved older brother Yoni at Entebbe. And Netanyahu is a secular Jew, whose Jewish identity is not expressed in strict Orthodox and Haredim observance. As Netanyahu begins the process of building his sixth Israeli coalition government, the unusual simplicity of the task belies its potentially drastic consequences But as he begins the process of building his sixth Israeli coalition government, the unusual simplicity of the task belies its potentially drastic consequences: Netanyahu’s Likud, far-right Religious Zionism and the ultra-Orthodox Shas and United Torah Judaism parties together won decisive majorities in the elections Tuesday — but no other party is likely to join them. Even if he wanted them, no other party would consent to Netanyahu’s left in government, his loyal partners would not approve such an addition, and any such party in any case would not have significant leverage. And so it will be up to Netanyahu, increasingly aggressive, to try to moderate those demands of his allies and his own hawkish Likud that he still considers beyond the pale. Having secured the basic legitimacy for the alliance of Religious Zionism — with its various radical three-party demands for the expulsion of “infidel Arabs,” the annexation of the entire West Bank without equal rights for the Palestinians, Jewish prayer on the Temple Mount, a pushback against LGBT rights and more — it will now be up to Netanyahu to rein in the more radical items on their agenda, if he’s so inclined. Since they know he has no coalition without them, this will be a formidable task. But it will be him or no one, especially if Israel’s judicial checks and balances are removed, as Religious Zionism suggests and this nascent coalition widely supports. Likud head Benjamin Netanyahu (center) meets with UTJ head Yitzchak Goldknopf (second from left) and other party officials, with Likud negotiator Yariv Levin (right) at a Jerusalem hotel on November 6, 2022. (Courtesy )
A surprisingly comfortable win
The Likud leader and his allies won an unexpectedly solid majority on Tuesday thanks to a combination of factors within and without his control. He brokered the merger of the Religious Zionist, Otzma Yehudit and Noam parties because he feared that Religious Zionist Bezalel Smotrich and Noam’s Avi Maoz could not cross the electoral threshold, wasting valuable far-right votes, and he had no desire to ensure the Kahanamarist. Ben Gvir’s return to the Knesset. He may not have anticipated how powerful the Ben Gvir electoral draw would become. And he could not have known that Benny Gantz’s National Unity party, with Orthodox candidates Chili Tropper and new recruit Matan Kahana available to reach out to non-extreme Modern Orthodox Jews, would choose to play its other new recruit, Gadi Eisenkot. , an outspoken supporter of the two-state solution. With its populist promises to restore a sense of security to Jewish Israelis, Religious Zionism, led by Smotrich (who did limited military service) and Ben Gvir (who was rejected by the IDF because of his extremist activities) won the votes 1 to 5 soldiers, according to Channel 12 news calculations on Friday, more than National Unity, with its two former military chiefs of staff, one of whom serves as the defense minister presiding over the IDF’s most preemptive campaign in years against Palestinian terrorists in the West Bank. Crucial to the larger-than-expected majority in the Netanyahu bloc, moreover, were the delusions and incompetences on the other side of the political spectrum. The Arab anti-Zionist Balad party appears to believe it has won a landslide victory with 138,093 votes after breaking away from its Hadash-Ta’al Joint List partners to run solo. Given that this represented only 2.9% of valid votes, and the threshold for Knesset representation is 3.25%, however, such a “success” is pyrrhic. Similarly, Labour’s Merav Michaeli’s persistent refusal to parallel the technical fusion of Religious Zionism and join forces with Meretz on the left, and outgoing Prime Minister Yair Lapid’s apparent inability to find enough carrots or sticks to change his mind, meant that Meretz also slipped below the threshold — with 150,715 votes, or 3.16% of the national vote. The rift between parties in the outgoing coalition saw Yesh Atid and National Unity vying for the same votes instead of focusing on Netanyahu’s bloc. And Lapid appeared to be running a defensive, low-key campaign for fear of being accused of trying to siphon off votes from Labor and Meretz – who he was accused of doing anyway. Yair Lapid and Merav Michaeli speak on the sidelines of the Knesset on June 22, 2022. (Olivier Fitoussi/Flash90) It is argued, including by expert pollsters, that if Labor had merged with Meretz and Balad had not split from Hadash-Ta’al, the election would have ended with 60 seats for Netanyahu’s bloc and 60 for all his opponents . That would not have given Lapid a path to power, but it would have thwarted Netanyahu for the fifth time in less than four years, with unknown consequences for his remaining leadership of his party and bloc. But the 60-60 assessment seems extremely problematic to me. While it is reasonable to assume that Labor and Meretz running together would have won considerably more than the four seats Labor managed alone, it is far from certain. Gideon Sa’ar’s New Hope merger with Gantz didn’t do much for the emergence of the National Unity alliance. Some Labor voters may have been dissuaded from voting for a merged list due to Meretz’s far more left-wing positions on the Palestinian conflict, the role Meretz’s Ghaida Rinawie Zoabi played in the downfall of the outgoing coalition, and many other factors. Balad’s breakaway, meanwhile, apparently boosted Arab turnout – which rose to 53.2% from a projected 40% or so earlier in the campaign – attracting voters who would not have voted for the Hadash-Ta’al combination – Ballad. It seems unlikely, therefore, that these three parties running together would have garnered as many votes as if Balad had gone solo. However, if 60-60 seems like an exaggeration, more unity of purpose and more effective organization in the anti-Netanyahu camp could clearly have reduced his bloc’s overwhelming (by recent Israeli standards) margin of victory, as near-parity in the popular further underlines. The Lapid camp did not want to campaign with the vicious ferocity employed by the other side—extending Netanyahu’s cynical attack on Gantz’s IDF bona fides—but also failed to match Netanyahu and Ben Gvir for energy and utter ruthlessness. As so often in the past, Netanyahu, ably assisted by all his associates, simply wanted it more.
From the most diverse coalitions to the most hard-line
Helped to return to power by his far-right and ultra-Orthodox allies, however, Netanyahu can only build his coalition with them and cannot attract a potentially moderating additional element as he did in previous years with Gantz, Lapid, Tzipi Livni. and Ehud Barak. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Hatnua party leader Tzipi Livni at a joint press conference where Livni announced that she will join Netanyahu’s government as justice minister, February 19, 2013. (Photo: Miriam Alster/FLASH90) There is no question of Lapid ever working with him as he did in 2013. Gantz chose to do so in 2020 at the height of the COVID crisis and blindly vows never to do so again. Avigdor Lieberman said on Friday that he strongly rejected Likud’s post-election proposals. It’s not inconceivable that Netanyahu could pick up a defector or two from the soon-to-be opposition ranks, but he wouldn’t even need an extra vote or two. It’s a complete party that could aim to win, in the spirit of its election night pledge to “heal the rifts” and “take care of all the citizens of Israel” — or at least slightly diversify the…
