Dec 11, 2019

This article is being written 16 hours before the 22nd Knesset will be dissolved, about three months after being chosen by the Israeli public. If no last-minute drama takes place, Israel will have to declare its third general elections in less than a year. Support for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who succeeded in attaining a bloc of 60 Knesset seats (without Avigdor Liberman’s Yisrael Beitenu) in April, deteriorated to only 55 seats in September. New polls indicate a continuation of the trend. Netanyahu is sliding toward departure from the prime minister’s residence on Balfour Street, a criminal trial and even perhaps imprisonment.

Right now in Israel, all political forces are bracing for a showdown, despite the predictions of the politicians and evaluations of almost all commentators (including the writer of this article). There are three people behind this imbroglio: Netanyahu, who clings to what's left of his power; Liberman, who is sticking to his campaign promise and is determined to end the Netanyahu era, even though he had originally been Netanyahu’s right-hand man; and Blue and White leader Benny Gantz, who floundered too long before deciding not to be seduced by the president's plan and Netanyahu’s ostensible agreement to temporary incapacitation after only a half-year term.

On Wednesday morning, 16 hours before the deadline after which the Knesset will be dissolved and elections will be announced, Liberman posted a scathing Facebook post that ended the hopes of the right that at the last minute, Liberman would return to Netanyahu in order to establish a narrow right wing/ultra-Orthodox government.

Instead, Liberman turned on Netanyahu, attacking him for the first time on a personal level. “Maybe you’re an agent of mysterious and wealthy elements from various places in the world, Mr. Prime Minister?” he wrote. “Are you the agent of James Packer? Perhaps you are the agent of Spencer Partrich? Are you perhaps serving the financial interests of Nathan Milikowsky? The difference between us is that I never let the ends justify the means and I never exchanged my principles for Knesset seats. So take a good, long look at the mirror, sit with yourself and do some soul-searching.”

In order to survive, Netanyahu needs a combination of miracles: He needs to attain a majority of 61 seats without Liberman to create a right-wing government. He needs to ask and receive immunity from the Knesset regarding a criminal trial. He needs to cross another legal hurdle as well: Can someone with a criminal charge sheet even receive a mandate to assemble a new government? According to most legal experts, the law allowing a prime minister to serve with a criminal trial in the offing only concerns a prime minister in the middle of a term. But the head of a caretaker government who did not receive the confidence of the public and was not successful in assembling a new government is only a regular Knesset member. According to legal interpretations, Netanyahu cannot be allowed to assemble a government. The problem is that should the High Court of Justice reach such a verdict, Israel will find itself closer than ever before to an irreversible schism between right and left and even violent confrontation between those who loathe Netanyahu and those who support him.