After four general elections in two years and much fractious politics, a new government led by former Defence Minister Naftali Bennett took over the reins in Israel at the weekend. Bennet became Prime Minister at the head of a coalition government which managed to muster a razor thin 60 seat majority vote in the Knesset. It defeated long-time Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party and its partners, who got 59 votes on Sunday. One Knesset member abstained.
Sunday’s change of guard marked the end of an era in Israeli politics and the focus of Israelis and the world will now be on how the new government will cope with the challenges of an Israel without the abrasive Netanyahu. During his 12 years as Prime Minister, Netanyahu was the champion of right wing Israelis for whom he was a bulwark against Palestinians, Arab neighbours and Iran. Other Israelis however saw him as a divisive political figure whose toxic divide and rule style polarised and damaged Israeli politics. He might also end up in jail, given the charges of fraud and corruption outstanding against him.
For the occupied and long-suffering Palestinians on the West Bank and Gaza, the Netanyahu era was a blight occasioned by continued land seizure, molestation and harassment and which brought the peace process to a screeching halt. Several rounds of brutal attacks by the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) followed every flare up of fighting in the Gaza Strip, the latest outrage occurring only last month when the world watched as Israeli bombs demolished high-rise buildings and killed more than 200 Palestinians.
With Netanyahu’s departure, the hope around the world is that the new government in Israel will tone down some of his hard line rhetoric and posture in his dealings with Palestinians and the world. This might be a forlorn hope, since new prime minister Bennet and his small Yamina party are also right-wing nationalists. The hope however is that his coalition partners, ranging from Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid party, some centre parties and even an Israeli Arab party would temper Bennet’s right wing instincts.
The new cabinet’s diversity is such that it will not find consensus of such big issues as the peace process, which is the main interest of the rest of the world. Instead, it is said that it will concentrate on domestic issues, on which it can build a consensus. What this means is that we will see little or no movement on the peace front for now. We hope however that unlike Netanyahu, the new government will not worsen matters with continued seizure of Palestinian land to resettle Jewish settlers, with bellicose language and with harsh measures that could lead to flare ups in violence. With Netanyahu gone, that is the least that the world expects from Israel’s new leaders.
