Still fighting Israel’s external enemies on multiple fronts, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu woke up Monday to a new political battleground at home.
The departure this weekend of Benny Gantz and his centrist National Unity party from Israel’s wartime emergency government is unlikely to immediately end Mr Netanyahu’s power. The prime minister’s ruling coalition still holds a slim majority of 64 seats in the 120-seat parliament.
But Mr Gantz’s move means Mr Netanyahu is now fully dependent on his far-right and ultra-Orthodox coalition partners as he pursues the Gaza war in the face of growing international abuse, leaving him increasingly isolated and exposed at home and abroad. abroad. .
Mr Gantz and Gadi Eisenkot, another National Unity stalwart, also left Mr Netanyahu’s small war cabinet. They are both former army chiefs who were widely seen as key voices of moderation in the five-member body, which was formed in October after Hamas’s attack on Israel prompted the Israeli bombardment and ground invasion of Gaza.
The two centrist politicians have boosted public confidence in government decision-making at a time of national trauma. They also gave the war cabinet an aura of legitimacy and consensus as Israel fought Hamas in Gaza, as well as arch-enemy Iran and its other proxies, including the powerful Hezbollah militia on Israel’s northern border with Lebanon.
Mr Gantz accused Mr Netanyahu of “political procrastination”, suggesting he had postponed crucial strategic decisions to ensure his political survival. His decision to quit the wartime government ushers in a new period of political instability and has left many Israelis wondering where the country goes from here.
Describing the political turmoil as “incredibly consequential,” Yohanan Plesner, president of the Israel Democracy Institute, a nonpartisan think tank in Jerusalem, said Israelis had already given the government low marks on many wartime issues. That included handling the fighting and relations with the United States, Israel’s crucial ally, he said.
“With Gantz gone, I expect those grades to go even lower,” Mr. Plesner said.
Mr Gantz issued an ultimatum three weeks ago, warning Mr Netanyahu he would dissolve the emergency government unless the prime minister came up with clear plans, including who would replace Hamas as the ruler of post-war Gaza and how will bring back the dozens of hostages still being held in the Palestinian enclave.
Mr Gantz joined the government last October to foster a sense of unity at a time of crisis. He joined forces with his political rival, Mr. Netanyahu, despite a deep lack of trust between the two and a history of betrayal. The last time Mr Gantz went into government with Mr Netanyahu, in 2020, it also ended badly after Mr Netanyahu broke the power-sharing agreement.
The influence of Mr Gantz and Mr Eisenkot, whose son, a soldier, was killed in December while fighting in Gaza, has waned in recent months, leading many Israelis to ask why they had not left the emergency government and joined the opposition earlier. Mr Gantz has called for early elections this autumn.
Mr. Netanyahu’s official partners remaining in the war cabinet are Defense Minister Yoav Galand, a rival of the conservative Likud party, whom Mr. Netanyahu tried to fire last year. and Ron Dermer, a seasoned Netanyahu confidant with more diplomatic than political experience. It is unclear whether the war cabinet will continue to function.
A separate and broader security cabinet includes two leaders of ultra-nationalist parties: Itamar Ben-Gvir, the minister of national security, and Bezalel Smotrich, the minister of finance. Both want to resettle Gaza with the Israelis.
Mr Ben-Gvir and Mr Smotrich have both vowed to topple Mr Netanyahu’s government if he goes ahead with an Israeli proposal for a deal that includes a ceasefire and a hostage exchange for Palestinian prisoners, which, as described by President Biden for a week ago, will effectively end the war.
At least two potentially destabilizing challenges now beset Mr. Netanyahu’s government, analysts say.
The first is the prospect of a deal with Hamas. Israeli and US officials say they are awaiting a formal response from Hamas on the truce proposal. A positive response could well force Mr Netanyahu to end the obfuscation and choose between a deal and the survival of his government.
The other challenge is the deeply polarized issue of wholesale exemptions from military service granted to ultra-Orthodox men enrolled in religious seminaries.
Ultra-Orthodox exemptions have long been a divisive issue in Israeli society, but tolerance for the decades-old policy has waned in a country where most 18-year-olds are conscripted for years of compulsory military service, and even more so during this war. The same group of reservists is being recalled repeatedly for long tours of duty in Gaza as the campaign winds down into its ninth month, with no clear plan, experts say, for where it is headed.
On Monday night or early Tuesday, the Israeli parliament was expected to vote on a recruitment bill that would essentially keep the ultra-Orthodox exemption system intact. Although he is under pressure from Mr Netanyahu to go soft on his ultra-Orthodox coalition partners, even some members of his conservative Likud party – including Mr Gallant, the defense minister – oppose it, particularly during a war the country has he needs more soldiers.
On the hiring front, Mr. Netanyahu is in a bind, Mr. Plessner said. “There is an inherent conflict between his own political base and his most valuable alliance with the ultra-Orthodox parties,” he added.
If it passes this first reading, the bill will go to committee before a second and third, final, vote. But even if it fails to pass, said Mr Plessner — himself a former lawmaker from a now-defunct centrist party — it would not necessarily herald the dissolution of parliament or the collapse of the government.
Mr. Netanyahu’s critics accuse him of prolonging the war to prevent elections and a public accounting for the government and military failures that led to the Oct. 7 attack.
Dismissing Mr Netanyahu’s stated war goal of “total victory” over Hamas, which many experts say is a vague and unattainable idea, Mr Gantz said in his resignation speech on Sunday that a “real victory” would be that which combined military success and diplomatic initiative.
“Real victory,” he said, means “changing national priorities, expanding the circle of services and those they serve, and ensuring that Israel is able to meet the challenges it faces.”
“Unfortunately, Netanyahu is preventing us from achieving a real victory,” he added.
Mr Netanyahu responded in a social media post to Mr Gantz, saying: “Israel is in an existential war on many fronts. Benny, this is not the time to abandon the campaign – this is the time to join forces.”
Now, analysts say, Mr. Netanyahu is likely to focus primarily on keeping his tight coalition together in the short term.
Parliament’s summer session ends at the end of July, and the legislature will not reconvene until after the Jewish High Days in late October or November.
“Netanyahu has only one thing on his mind,” said Gail Talshir, a political scientist at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. “Maintaining his own power as prime minister.”
“His main goal is to drag this coalition far enough into the fall,” he said, so that the next Israeli election will not be held until after the presidential election in the United States.
Mr. Netanyahu, he said, probably hoped that Donald Trump, the candidate he sees as most sympathetic to his causes, could then be elected.
That would mean that if he can get through the next six weeks, Mr. Netanyahu could live to fight another day.
