I know. But Abraham Lincoln’s famous warning about a house divided against itself came immediately to mind when I read this:
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s new unity government was sworn in Sunday, cementing a fragile political alliance with former rival Benny Gantz to end more than one year of political stalemate in the country.
Messrs. Netanyahu and Gantz now face the challenge of keeping together a government run by two factions with opposing views on several key issues — from annexing parts of the Israel-occupied West Bank to preserving the judiciary’s power.
(The Wall Street Journal, May 17, 2020)
Mind you, Gantz is too conservative for my liking. Simon Peres, or even Yitzhak Rabin, he is not. But I am truly shocked that he is sacrificing his hard-won reputation for courage and integrity at the altar of Netanyahu’s craven ambition.
Gantz and Netanyahu led their respective parties to deadlock-election results in April 2019, in September 2019, and again in March 2020. Taking Israel through those circles of electoral hell led to this Faustian coalition.
But, when I was still filled with hope, here is the instructive way I pitted these men against each other in “PM Netanyahu Hails Israel as ‘Only for the Jewish People’…?” March 12, 2019:
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Netanyahu will face a truly formidable opponent, namely Israeli war hero Benny Gantz, leader of the Blue and White Party. Gantz demonstrated this during a recent national address when he
- ordered Netanyahu to do the honorable thing and resign in light of the Israeli attorney general’s decision to indict him for bribery, fraud, and breach of trust; and
- yelled at Netanyahu for embracing Trump and mocked him as a wannabe Trump, namely a pampered, trust-fund coward blustering as a Mafia don.
Oy Vey!
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This is why it’s so stupefying that Gantz is joining a Netanyahu-led coalition government. Oh, did I mention that Netanyahu goes on trial next week on those aforementioned charges…?
Then again, perhaps that’s the point for the wily Gantz. After all, a conviction would clear the path for him to assume the premiership and place Netanyahu where no doubt Gantz and most Israelis believe he belongs.
But God help Israel if Netanyahu is acquitted. Because, even though this coalition calls for him and Gantz to swap positions after 18 months, Netanyahu is not going to play second banana to Gantz when/if that time comes.
At the very least, in the spirit of lex talionis, he will do to a Prime Minister Gantz what his coalition partners repeatedly did to him during his four previous stints as prime minister. Specifically, he will continually threaten to dissolve the coalition whenever Gantz fails to do his bidding.
In short, an acquitted Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu will do to Israel what a re-elected President Donald J. Trump will do to America. As I remarked in “Trump Targets Iran to ‘Wag the Dog’ – Just as He ‘Projected’ Obama Would Do,” January 5, 2020, Trump and Netanyahu are birds of a feather if ever there were two.
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