Israeli Politics in 2024 and Beyond

The Collapse of the Left-Right Divide

As global politics is being shaken up so is the local political scene in many democracies.  In Israel the current 5 front war – in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, West Bank and the Red Sea – has collapsed what has been the key aspect of the left-right divide at least since the mid 1970’s.    Until October 7 you were measured on the left and right by the level of your support for “settlements” on the West Bank and if you called it the “west bank” or “Judea and Samaria” (we here use West Bank just for clarity purposes).   If you were to read the main Left and Right newspapers, you would see that for the left-wing Haaretz there is no problem in Israel that cannot be solved by getting rid of West Bank settlements and the right wing Makor Rishon newspaper there was no problem in the country that cannot be solved by adding more settlements in Judea and Samaria – both sides of the same coin.  Both depended on “settlements” for their ideological compass.

This was true not only for security issues but also for economic, social and religious issues.  Everything on all sides pointed back to “settlements”.  If you were a right-wing politician you had to be against the removal or even containment of any legal or illegal town or village.  If you needed the support of the left-wing base all of these towns or villages were by definition illegal.   This is not to say that this was the key issue for every or even for most voters – but much like abortion or gun control or the welfare reform form key left-right divide issues in the US, settlements was in Israel. 

This is no longer the case although it is not clear if the politicians and the press fully understand this.   Those politicians and pundits on the right still feel that October 7 vindicated their point of view since it is the presence of these settlements that protect the center of the country – they are a buffer so to speak – from an October 7 in the Tel Aviv or Jerusalem metropolitan centers.   While the Israeli presence there does prevent much terror since the IDF has boots on the ground and the Shabach has an extensive intelligence presence there, they ignore the fact that settlements themselves did not stop the actual October 7 attacks.

On the left, they too think that October 7 has vindicated their view that the right prevented the creation of a Palestinian state by trusting Hamas too much and by thinking that a Palestinian state could be ignored so long as Hamas controlled Gaza.  But the left of course ignored the support for terror that occurs regularly by the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.

With this paradigm broken – where is Israeli politics heading?

Bibi and Gantz

So far, we have written over 400 words on Israeli politics and have not mentioned the one man who has dominated it for the past 20 year – Benjamin Netanyahu.   Like his cabinet mate and current chief rival, Benny Gantz, he surely feels that the more time that goes by after October 7 the less people will hold him responsible for the disaster.   Both of these men share responsibility for different reasons – Netanyahu for being Prime Minister for most of these years and allowing the IDF to morph into an arrogant, groupthink organization under his nose and Gantz for being one of the main reasons it morphed into that.   The only way Netanyahu wins again is if Biden and Co. and/or Ehud Barak and Co. (the puppeteer of the Judicial reform protest and the current anti-Bibi obsession) continue their ABB (Anyone But Bibi) campaign that has lost more often than the Washington Generals.

The Others

If Hamas is not destroyed and if the 80,000 residents of the north who were told to leave their homes do not feel secure enough to return to their homes, then it seems obvious that neither Netanyahu nor Gantz can win an election.  This leaves us with five current members of the Knesset who could, theoretically, be looked upon as potential Prime Ministers – Yair Lapid, Gadi Eizenkott, Nir Barkat, Gidon Saar and Avigdor Lieberman. 

Lapid is the leader of what is currently the second largest party in the Knesset and the leader of the opposition. Hi Yesh Atid (there is a future) party has 24 seats but currently polls around 10-13.  Lapid decided not to join the unity government with Gantz in the days after the war started since he wanted the option of attacking Netanyahu instead of joining with him.   It seems that Lapid has given up on his dream of being Prime Minister (he was for a few months during a transition government) and instead wants to lead the country’s left in perpetual opposition.

Gadi Eizenkott is Benny Gantz’s partner in the National Unity Party but is not considered very close to him.   Both are former IDF Chief of Staffs but while Gantz has been leaning towards the right, Eizenkot has been swaying more towards the left.  He may end up staying with Gantz in the next election although there is pressure on him to go and compete in the Labor Party internal primaries.  The Israeli left has tried to counter its policies of appeasement towards the Arabs by drafting military men to lead them but it has not really brought them much success.  Eizenkot is thought to be the next candidate to save the left,  but if he chooses to go to Labor it means he is not interested in being Prime Minister as Labor has gone the way of the Whigs.

Nir Barkat is a member of the Likud and is thought to be  the prime rival of Netanyahu in the party.  He is independently wealthy, having made his money in venture capital and was mayor of Jerusalem for 10 years.  He is positioning himself to the right of Netanyahu.  It will be difficult to challenge Bibi in an internal Likud primary but he is waiting in the wings in case he falls.  Were the Likud to lose the next election he would be one of the top 2 or 3 candidates to succeed him.

Gidon Sa’ar is also an interesting candidate.  He was considered a successor to Netanyahu during his many years in the Likud.   He is an experienced politician and holds sway in the Knesset.  However, he has not proven much of a vote getter recently.  He left the Likud 5 years ago and has led a right of center party who vowed not to sit with a Netanyahu led Likud, and was a member of the government previous to the current one.  He joined with Gantz in the last election but last week split with him and now has his own party with four seats in the Knesset.  He is more hawkish than Netanyahu and in spite of his anti-Bibi rhetoric seems to be getting closer to him.  There are rumors of a return to the Likud, but that seems unlikely now.

That leaves us with one of the more interesting politicians in Israel – Avigdor Lieberman.  He is an immigrant from the former Soviet Union who started his career by running Netanyahu’s office during his first term as PM back in 1996.  He left the Likud to form a more right wing party and had been the resident “corrupt-fascist” of the Israeli left until he surprisingly decided not to help Netanyahu form a government in April 2019 – a move which led to a string of 5 elections until Netanyahu finally won outright in 2022. Ever since Leiberman joined the anti-Bibi camp he, not surprisingly, is no longer known as a corrupt fascist.   Both the press and the prosecution have stopped attacking him.   Leiberman now leads the Yisrael Beitenu (Israel is our Home) party which has six seats in the Knesset. Most of the votes for this party come from immigrants from the ex-Soviet Union although he has been able to attract right wing native Israelis over the years.  

He is interesting now in that most of what he has stated regarding Hamas, Iran and other security issues have been correct.  He has opposed paying off Hamas and has consistently pushed for more aggressive action during this war.  During his short stint as Defense Minister under Netanyahu he was thwarted by the defense establishment into make changes that everyone now understands as necessary.  Many ex-Likud voters would consider voting for him.

The Outsiders

Of those who are not currently in the Knesset Naftali Bennet and his partner Ayelet Shaked could partner with Lieberman or Saar – or all four together  - in order to stake a claim to national leadership.    Both Bennet and Shaked started off working for Netanyahu but he guided them out of the Likud (something he does with many talented people) and a post-Bibi return for both is not out of the question (although Bennet would have a harder time than Shaked in getting internal votes).

If you see a pattern of people who used to work for Netanyahu and now can’t stand him – you are right.

There are a few other possibilities of people who have not yet joined the political scene but could form their own parties or join the Likud or other right of center parties.  The first Is Yossi Cohen who was the head of the Mossad.  Cohen was often considered as Netanyahu’s as his hand picked successor but since he has left the Mossad, Cohen has distanced himself from his radioactive mentor.  

The other is a former Brigadier General Amir Avivi who is head of the IDSF -Israel Defense and Security Forum (HaBithonistim in Hebrew).  Less than two years ago the IDSF released a report which exactly  predicted the Hamas attack of October 7.   He has been a regular on some of the Israeli TV channels during the war (although not the main one as he doesn’t follow their line) and there are rumors he is looking to form a right of center party and run in the next elections.   

If you want to ask why we haven’t discussed any left of center possibilities its because there are none.  Contra Biden/Blinken/Schumer there are no more “two-state-solution  let Hamas live  and the PA is wonderful” people left in Israel – or at least not enough to elect an actual political party.   If the polls are at all “big picture” accurate what was the Israeli left will be 4 seats of a more radical left-wing party combined with Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid – which is basically an extension of the US Democratic party.     Together they will get maybe 14 of the 120 seats in the Knesset. 

So where is Israeli politics headed in 202-2025?

When will there be Elections?

If the war in Gaza ends with a victory or stalemate and there is some way to pretend that there is no war in the north, there will be pressure to schedule elections.  The Israeli election cycle is usually 4-6 months meaning the earliest date would be the fourth quarter of this year.   This could happen if the summer session of the Knesset is filled with frustration and if Gantz and Saar decide to leave the government.  What seems more likely is that they will set a date later in the year for an election sometime in the first half of 2025. 

Who will Win?

The polls now point to Benny Gantz being able to form a center-right government whose security policies will mirror the current one.   If this were to happen it would mark the end of Netanyahu’s reign and bring a new leader to the Likud – which would be a senior partner in this government. 

Why I don’t think this will happen if elections are anywhere from 9-15 months ahead is because the feeling that the politicians and the media don’t get what is going on in the country.   With 1,700 deaths and many thousands wounded and with 500,000 soldiers in uniform risking their lives in Gaza, the West Bank and the North on a daily basis – everyone has been personally touched by this war in a way that this country has not experienced since 1973.   My feeling is that new leadership will come out of this war as reservists saw first hand what the failure of the current leadership brought.   The army is too small, there was not enough ammunition in reserve, the intelligence failures were enormous, the Air Force was too late to the game on October 7 and the General Staff was absent on that fateful day.   There is much talk in the media and politics in a National Commission of Inquiry into the war, but that is because they are all hoping for a bit of a reprieve.  The country doesn’t need a commission of judges and generals to tell them what happened because the entire country knows that there was a failure not only of October 7 but of the entire security concept that claimed that we need a small, smart army since there will be no regular wars again and the political class – across the spectrum had no control over the army and helped create the concept that failed.

This started with Ehud Barak and continued to Benjamin Netanyahu.  The entire country knows that every IDF Chief of Staff, Prime Minister and Defense Minister for the last 25 years is at fault and sold the country a bill of goods.  The entire country knows that not one IDF senior officer was held to task and relieved of his command since October 7.  As a matter of fact the chief intelligence officer for the Southern Command, a colonel who failed utterly in the lead up and on October 7 was just relieved of his command – but not because of that failure but rather due to the fact that we was having an affair with a junior officer under his command.

If the elections are held later – that is in the first half of 2025 - my feeling is that we will see some of these new faces – hopefully in combination with some old, experienced faces – and will lead to a resounding victory over the current political and military establishment.   This will lead, in my view to a  re-invigoration of Israeli democracy as it moves out of the Netanyahu-Barak-Gantz-Lapid era that was focused on yes/no West Bank settlements on yes/no Bibi and on even yes/no Zionism to a new covenant between the people. 

The 1973 Yom Kippur War brought a new generation of leaders (Begin and Shamir and Rabin and Peres) which led to the Barak-Netanyahu years.   This generation has proven that while they brought much good to Israel economically, they have also brought the country to the brink of social and military disaster and while they won’t voluntarily step away – they will be shown the door.   Ehud Barak has not been a vote magnet since his failed two years as Prime Minister.  He served as Defense Minister under Netanyahu and they share a strategic vision (although neither will admit it).   In the meanwhile, Barak has become very wealthy and has an oversized influence on the current and recent IDF General Staffs and whose main goal seems to be to “get Bibi”.   In my own opinion it is more than that – it is to punish the Israeli people for throwing him out of the (elected) political system.  I only explain all of this in order to explain why I consider these the Barak-Bibi years.

In my view everyone “raised” during these years in the military and in politics will be shunned in the next election – not thrown out totally but be brought down to a level where they will realize their time has come.

The New Consensus

The Israeli consensus is building around the old concept of security first, understanding that we live not in Western Europe but in the middle east and while we don’t have to share the moral and political values of the middle-east we have to make the rest of the region understand that their way of life will be threatened by our might.   According to those who know Arab literature, religion and society best (the likes of Mordecai Keidar and Idit  Bar for example) believe that peace with the Arab world is possible as long as we understand peace in the Islamic sense – peace with the infidels is always possible if war means the ruin of the “Umma” – the Islamic nation.  Israelis are starting to understand that there is no way other than true deterrence.  And true deterrence in the middle east is only the threat of massive military power. 

This consensus does not mean there will be no left or right and that there won’t be political divisions – only that these divisions will be different than they were, with different personalities then we had before and hopefully, will be less existential. 

I am very pessimistic about the state of the world but not to the point where all is lost.  The West can change its ways and, in spite of Israel now seemingly standing alone  - it can lead the way to a more secure and more free future.