Benjamin Netanyahu: Bye-bye Bibi?

Benjamin Netanyahu is a man of firsts: the youngest-ever Israeli prime minister; the longest-serving; leader of the most right-wing coalition government Israel has seen. And now, the man in charge during what many consider the most devastating attack on the country in its 75-year history — and overseeing an Israeli ground and air assault of unprecedented ferocity on the Palestinian territory of Gaza.

On October 7, Hamas, the Palestinian group that controls Gaza, staged a heinous and multipronged attack on Israel — one that left about 1,200 dead (the vast majority civilians), upwards of 3,300 injured, more than 200 kidnapped, with evidence of rape and mutilation.

Israel’s response was swift and merciless. Within hours, Netanyahu vowed: “We will take mighty vengeance for this black day ... We will turn Gaza into a deserted island. To the citizens of Gaza, I say you must leave now. We will target each and every corner of the strip.”

Only, there’s really been nowhere to go; Gaza is a sliver of land measuring just 40km by about 10km — not even a quarter the size of Joburg — with a population of 2.3-million shoehorned in. The vast majority has now been further squeezed into the central and southern parts, and Israel has throttled the delivery of water, electricity, fuel and aid into the territory.

At the time of writing, it’s estimated that more than 18,000 civilians have been killed, 7,700 of them children, news service Al Jazeera reports. Apartment buildings have been flattened and hospitals bombed, and humanitarian aid is sketchy.

There’s no doubt the war will be the defining moment of Netanyahu’s tenure — and his legacy.

But if he’d hoped for a “rally around the flag” effect — the increase in popular support for leaders during times of crisis — he’s seen nothing of the sort. Polling has been “abysmal”, Dahlia Scheindlin, a political analyst and columnist at Haaretz tells the FM; trust in Netanyahu’s government is at a 20-year low, and his party, Likud, has lost more than 40% of its support.

A poll by Israel’s Channel 12 in early November found 76% of Israelis want Netanyahu to resign.

For now, that’s neither here nor there. As Scheindlin points out, the country isn’t in an election cycle. And it’s highly unlikely that there will be a change in political leadership at a time of crisis.

But Netanyahu’s popularity was plummeting before the war. There are the three cases of fraud, bribery and breach of trust before the courts. There’s also his headline-making attempted “reform” of the judiciary earlier this year, which brought Israelis — including members of the defence establishment — out on the streets in protest.

In July, the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, passed the first amendment: to remove from the Supreme Court the power to overrule government decisions it finds “extremely unreasonable”. In effect, the move would give the courts a secondary role to the government.

Additional changes would give the government a decisive say in picking judges, and to remove the current requirement that lawmakers follow the advice of legal advisers, under the attorney-general, according to the BBC. In all, it would undermine the democratic order and the independence of the judiciary.

Most defining, of course, has been the October 7 attack. For a country where security is like “a holy grail”, says Scheindlin, this could spell the end of Netanyahu politically. The self-styled “Mr Security” has been panned not just for the government’s failure to anticipate the attack and respond adequately to the needs of displaced citizens, but also for the role his administration played in propping up Hamas in the first place.

Essentially, fanatic theocrats have completely overtaken the professional assessment of what the country actually needs [from] a security perspective

—  Dahlia Scheindlin

First, despite reportedly having the blueprint of a Hamas attack in its hands months before it happened, the Israeli intelligence establishment reportedly waved off the threat, figuring the movement had neither the capacity nor the intent to carry it out.

Then there was the diversion of Israel Defence Forces troops (IDF) to the Palestinian West Bank. Under the Likud party, Israeli settlements there — considered illegal by the UN — have ballooned, from 4,000, when Likud took power in 1977, to 500,000 today (excluding East Jerusalem), Robert Pape writes in Foreign Affairs.

There’s no sign of that slowing down. Tor Wennesland, UN special co-ordinator for the Middle East peace process, told the Security Council in September of reports of advanced plans for 6,300 housing units in the West Bank, and about 3,580 housing units in East Jerusalem. The government’s actions, he said, likely expedited settlement expansion.

It’s part and parcel of Netanyahu’s deal to win power in the 2022 elections. A fragmented Israeli polity means government by coalition. In this case Likud won just 32 of the 120 seats in the Knesset. A weak Netanyahu thus joined forces with ultra-orthodox and religious Zionist parties, which largely have him over a barrel. They’re in favour not just of the expansion of settlements, but also the outright annexation of Palestinian land.

As a result, tensions in the West Bank have flared, and IDF troops were partly redeployed from the Gaza border to manage the fallout.

“Essentially, fanatic theocrats have completely overtaken the professional assessment of what the country actually needs [from] a security perspective. And that affects everything,” says Scheindlin.

Finally, as The New York Times (NYT) recently reported, there’s that small matter of the government for years allowing Qatar to channel millions of dollars a month to Hamas — $30m a month by 2021.

It’s thought that funding to Hamas, which governs Gaza, freed up the movement’s budget to divert resources to its military operations.

Netanyahu swears blind the money was allowed for humanitarian purposes only. But earlier speculation is that he wanted to prop up Hamas to entrench divisions between the movement and the Palestinian Authority, which governs the West Bank. Without a unified Palestinian front, Netanyahu can claim he has no partner to negotiate with, and so can sidestep talks around a possible two-state solution.

In addition, “the logic of Israel was that Hamas should be strong enough to rule Gaza, but weak enough to be deterred by Israel”, Yossi Kuperwasser, a former head of research for Israel’s military intelligence, told the NYT.

It was about containment over confrontation, the publication reports — the hope that the problem would simply “fade away”, in the words of Israel’s former national security adviser Eyal Hulata.

A huge misstep.

The logic of Israel was that Hamas should be strong enough to rule Gaza, but weak enough to be deterred by Israel

—  Yossi Kuperwasser

The issue has had broader global implications too — and not just in terms of highlighting divisions on the issue, despite what seem clear violations of international law.

US-brokered rapprochement between Israel and the Arab nations may flounder as a result — in particular, ongoing talks between Saudi Arabia and Israel have been put on hold, and Saudi Arabia has engaged with Israel’s arch-enemy and Hamas backer Iran, Al Jazeera reports.

The attack was, in part, a message from Hamas that the Palestine issue cannot be relegated to the background in negotiations about a future Middle East, according to a Reuters report — as it largely has been, for politically expedient reasons.

Where does that leave things on the more localised level? Disaffection is a powerful weapon. The more Israel continues its active assault on Gaza, the more Palestinians may be turning to Hamas. That leaves the concern that this could become Netanyahu’s forever war — or, at the least, an interminable occupation. 

The right-wing government’s strategy on Gaza has failed. Netanyahu’s strategy has failed.

This could spell the end for the ultimate political survivor. If an election were held tomorrow, he’d likely be removed from office. But, says Scheindlin, Netanyahu “has got himself out of some very tight spots. The kind of things no-one could get out of politically, he’s got himself out. That doesn’t mean he’ll be able to this time, because the situation is unprecedented.”