Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s bloc will probably not reach 61 seats. Yet Likud figures are already reportedly exploring what happens next: A unity government in which Netanyahu – who else? – remains would insist on him serving as prime minister first, followed by Gadi Eisenkot in a rotation.
Around that swirls a broader media discussion of what should happen if “neither bloc gets a majority.” A unity government in which Netanyahu – who else? – remains prime minister first, followed by Gadi Eisenkot in a rotation.
The entire thesis rests on a false premise.
The two outcomes of the election
On Election Day, there are two possible political outcomes: A majority for continuing Netanyahu’s tenure or a majority for replacing him.
If Netanyahu does not get 61 seats, the other bloc does, with the sole exception of an exact 60-60 tie in a 120-seat Knesset. Yet the wily prime minister has relentlessly seeded the idea that Israeli politics consists of three blocs.
These would be the Netanyahu bloc (clerical, autocratic and settler-driven), the bloc opposed to him, and a separate Arab bloc that somehow floats outside the calculation when deciding who won.
The media, which until the 2019 elections generally spoke of two blocs, gradually adopted this framing. Polls now routinely display the Arab parties as a third category, with a separate slice in its own color. It is nonsense that plays directly into Netanyahu’s hands. Worse, parts of the opposition have gone along with it.
The mistake is conflating two questions: Who won the election, and what coalition will be formed afterward. The bloc answers the first; post-election negotiations answer the second.
There is an incumbent government and an alternative. In this case, one camp seeks to continue Netanyahu’s tenure, and another seeks to end it. If the first has 61 seats, Netanyahu won; if the second has 61 seats, he lost.
Then the winner will try to translate that majority into a government, and the coalition will need not mirror the winning bloc. It can be a minority government supported from outside, exclude parties that helped produce the majority, or bring in parties and Knesset members from the other camp.
Israeli history makes this perfectly clear. In 1988, the right-wing and religious bloc led by Yitzhak Shamir won 65 seats. Shamir plainly won, yet formed a unity government with the Alignment, his principal center-left rival, and served as prime minister without a rotation. The bloc determined the winner; Shamir then decided what government to form.
Four years later, Labor under Yitzhak Rabin won 44 seats, Meretz 12, and the Arab parties Hadash and the Arab Democratic Party five between them – 61 seats in the camp replacing Shamir.
Rabin had won. Yet he did not bring the Arab parties into his coalition. Instead, he brought in Shas, with six seats, and relied on Arab support from outside on important votes. Under the “Netanyahu method,” Rabin did not win, and neither bloc had a majority. In reality, Rabin obviously won, and nobody was confused. The bloc determined who won; the coalition was built afterward.
THAT IS what today’s discourse obscures by removing the Arab parties from the bloc calculation. One need not regard Hadash-Ta’al as an appropriate partner for a Zionist government, or even bring Ra’am – a thoroughly worthy party — into the coalition, to understand that if these parties are part of 61 seats opposed to Netanyahu’s continued tenure, there is a majority to replace him.
Whether Eisenkot then relies on outside support, brings in Shas, reaches agreements with Likud figures, or constructs something else comes later; it will be up to him.
Some political logic supports parts of the change camp distancing themselves from the Arab parties. Anyone trying to attract right-wing voters knows that publicly embracing them may scare away the very voters one hopes to attract.
But everyone should also understand that after the election, Arab votes may be integral to the bloc replacing Netanyahu, which is far preferable to giving him what he wants – to keep milking the country and to lead it over the abyss.
A parallel game is underway on the other side. Netanyahu knows the haredi (ultra-Orthodox) parties hurt him electorally and push some voters toward the opposing camp. Hence the Likud’s talk of a “broad government,” with the obvious implication of reducing dependence on the haredim.
Both sides are practicing campaign politics, playing down partners who complicate their appeal to swing voters. This can safely be ignored when tallying the two blocs.
Netanyahu certainly understood the arithmetic in 2021, when, after falling short, he tried to lure Ra’am into an arrangement that could keep him in power. It might have worked but for Bezalel Smotrich’s veto, revealing him as a man of principle when it came to racism.
The two camps also represent very different directions for Israel. On one side is a right-wing, religious, and ultra-Orthodox bloc steering the country in a more clerical and autocratic direction, weakening institutional checks on coalition power and accepting indefinite Israeli rule over millions of Palestinians in the West Bank without equal political rights.
NETANYAHU’S ALLIANCE with the ultra-Orthodox parties also prevents serious action on one of Israel’s greatest structural problems.
The haredi population is growing extraordinarily fast, while large numbers of its men do not participate sufficiently in the workforce, receive the core education needed for a productive modern economy, or share the burden of military service.
If this model continues, demographics will threaten Israel’s ability to remain a modern and prosperous state. Opposing that is hardly some petty fixation with Netanyahu.
Facing it is an admittedly less homogeneous bloc encompassing the center, Left, parts of the statesmanlike Right and the Arab parties. Its members profoundly disagree with each other on some matters, but share a desire to change direction.
They wish to preserve Israeli democracy and its institutions, confront the long-term implications of ruling the West Bank, overhaul the relationship with haredi society on military service, education, and employment, and guarantee equality for Israel’s Arab citizens.
Two approaches, two blocs.
There is also no shame in defining the election as a contest between a bloc supporting Netanyahu and one opposing him. He has been prime minister for so long that he now embodies a continuation of the status quo.
If 61 Knesset members oppose Netanyahu’s continued tenure, his camp has lost, whether the 61st seat comes from Ra’am, Hadash-Ta’al, or anyone else.
If Eisenkot heads that majority, he can form a minority government, rely on Arab support from the outside, negotiate with Shas, or try to bring in parts of the Likud. Coalition-building comes afterward.
And that is why Eisenkot should reject any proposal under which Netanyahu serves first in a rotation after the anti-Netanyahu camp wins 61 – as if he had no leverage.
Another period as prime minister would give Netanyahu time to rebuild alliances, break apart the opposing camp, and change the political landscape before the rotation ever arrives.
Giving that time to a prime minister whose camp lost its majority would turn the election result on its head. It would be pathetic gullibility.
There are two blocs. One of them will win. Please, do not fall for Netanyahu’s spin.
The writer is the former Cairo-based Middle East editor and London-based Europe/Africa editor of the Associated Press.