As confusing as Tuesday's results might be for some, if democracy is about expressing the will of the people, then the elections achieved that goal perfectly. Because the real truth about Israelis and their politics is that the people don't know what they want. Some people, like Tzipi Livni, believe an end to Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the creation of an independent Palestinian state are the only ways to preserve Israeli democracy over the long term. A not insignificant bloc of the Israeli public believes that a Palestinian state will be the beginning of the end of Israel. About 10 days before polling day, a lobby group calling itself Australian Friends of Gush Katif — one group of 17 Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip evacuated following Israel's disengagement from Gaza — paid for a full-page advertisement on page 3 of The Jerusalem Post. In black and red text printed over the image of a dove carrying an olive branch were the words "With G-d's blessing We say NO to a Palestinian State". "Voters please note," the ad continued. "Only the following parties have made a commitment … that they will vote AGAINST the establishment of a Palestinian State on Jewish soil." The four parties listed were an all-star line-up of the extreme Israeli right-wing: Avigdor Lieberman's Yisrael Beitenu, the religious Zionist Jewish Home party, the National Union party, and Shas, the party of ultra-orthodox Sephardic Jews.

What was most striking about this ad was not its central message of opposition to a Palestinian state, but that it gave the impression that the four parties listed all thought along the same political lines. In reality, the leaders of those four parties cannot bear each other, and each has radically different dreams for the state of Israel. Between them, these four parties will control 33 seats in the new Israeli Parliament. Ruling over a country that is being pulled in such different directions is what awaits the leader of Israel's next governing coalition. According to most back-of-the-envelope permutations, that looks like being Netanyahu. Whether or not he will open the door to Livni's Kadima party, or Ehud Barak's Labor party, to join a government of national unity, remains unclear.

Judging from the mood of some of his most influential party members, such as former Knesset speaker Reuven Rivlin, it would seem that Netanyahu might be inclined to exclude the more moderate side of Israeli politics. "First of all, any government will have to be based on the national camp," thundered Rivlin on election night. "We need to change the policy of the previous government. There's no argument over that." When Kimche was at the top of his game as a secret agent inside the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad in 1977, he was considered a consummate political insider who had grown close to the ruling Labor elite. Reportedly wary of the new Likud prime minister Menachem Begin, Kimche was concerned that Begin's tough ideological positions would impede Israel's relations with its neighbours. Then Begin delivered the biggest coup of all, peace with Egypt that involved handing back the Sinai Peninsula, proving himself a pragmatist after all. As Netanyahu prepares his return to the prime minister's office, the same whispers of doubt are sure to be heard in some corridors of Israeli power. His return will almost certainly not be greeted with any joy by the Obama Administration either, many of whose key players, including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, will remember what it was like trying to deal with Netanyahu when he was prime minister back in the late 1990s.

Yet despite the criticisms of Netanyahu then, he too flashed a pragmatic streak. Netanyahu pledged never to even talk to then Palestine Liberation Organisation chairman Yasser Arafat, but ended up signing what was considered at the time to be a major agreement with Arafat at Wye River in 1998. Given the complexity and diversity of opinion that exists across the Israeli political spectrum, another Netanyahu-led coalition may yet have the capacity to surprise.