It has become part of the past.. Who will rule Israel if Netanyahu leaves? A more extreme government or a centrist coalition?

For many years, Israel Hayom was known as “Bibiton,” a Hebrew word meaning “Bibi’s newspaper,” the nickname of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. It was founded by the late billionaire casino magnate Sheldon Adelson to be Netanyahu's mouthpiece, but today it calls for "Netanyahu's departure."

Last week, the newspaper's head of news, Uri Dagon, indicated a split in the ranks and called on the prime minister to "lead the country to victory and then leave," revealing that the ongoing political wrangling while the war rages has reached a new level.

In Israel's fractured and divided politics, it was a sign that Netanyahu's political era is teetering on its bitter end.

Israel's leaders fell after the 1973 and Lebanon wars

Netanyahu is widely blamed for security failures that allowed thousands of Hamas fighters to stream across the border from Gaza and carry out attacks unparalleled in Israel's history. Now the Israelis are preoccupied with the idea of “the days to come.” If the first day after that describes what happens in Gaza if Hamas is overthrown, then the second day seems like an expected reset of the country’s policy, in the post-Netanyahu era, which does not believe that only a few of those loyal to him will survive.

Many point to the historic change of the old guard in Israeli politics following the 1973 war, which was represented by the overthrow of Golda Meir and the end of the dominance of the Labor Party, which had ruled Israel since its founding in 1948.

Amit Segal, chief political commentator for Israel's Channel 2, recently told CNN: "History has taught us that every surprise and crisis leads to the collapse of the government." He added: "This was the case in 1973 with Golda Meir, in 1982 with Menachem Begin in the First Lebanon War, and in 2006 with Ehud Olmert in the Second Lebanon War. The clock is ticking."

The Hamas breakthrough came after a year of madness

It remains uncertain what Netanyahu's departure will look like and how he will be replaced. However, two words now frequently used to describe the new government are “normal” and “sane,” meaning that the far-right religious parties and nationalist settler parties, with which Netanyahu was in coalition, should be stripped of their influence.

In her Knesset office, Merav Michaeli, leader of the Labor Party, said she believes a reset “is not only a possible process, but also a necessity.” She described the Hamas attack as a “breakthrough” that comes at the end of a “crazy year” in which Netanyahu and his extreme right tried to dismantle the independence of one of the main pillars of what it describes as the democratic settlement in Israel, namely the country’s Supreme Court, sparking months of mass protests. She said: "The Israelis are disappointed. They did not get the security they were promised."

Netanyahu's departure

Protests against judicial amendments in Israel in March 2023 - Reuters

“I have never felt so unsafe,” she added. “We need to replace the leadership otherwise we won’t be able to rebuild anything.”

In the last election, in 2022, the left-wing Meretz party failed to cross the electoral threshold, meaning it gained no seats in the Knesset, while Labor's share fell to just four seats.

As the left and center-left collapsed, Israeli opposition parties shifted dramatically to the right, competing on crowded ground defined by the Likud Party.

The Likud Party, which holds 32 of the 120 seats in the Knesset, remains the most organized party among the Israeli parties. But Michaeli believes that it is no longer a party capable of winning more than 30 seats, the number that allowed it to lead several coalitions over the past fifteen years.

The tensions that Michaeli can see within Likud lead her to hope for a possible split, which reflects the experience of the Israeli left.

There is a broad opposition movement calling for Netanyahu's departure

For Haaretz columnist Yossi Verter, what marks the difference between the post-1973 reset and today is not just the media and social media being able to act more quickly, but also the presence of a broad anti-Netanyahu opposition movement that was already on the streets.

“There was corruption and decadence at that time too,” he wrote last week, referring to the 1970s and echoing Michaeli’s criticism. He added: "The situation has greatly worsened in Netanyahu's recent governments: unfortunate appointments to senior positions, the inclusion of mentally ill criminals in decision-making positions, the promotion of extremist and racist settlers who support Jewish terrorism to the most critical positions, and the establishment of a media poisoning machine that works 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, attacking... Everything that is good and reasonable in Israel, and everything that is evil and unclean is glorified,” he said.

Popular support for him and his allies is collapsing...and here is the most prominent beneficiary

This argument seems to be confirmed by recent opinion polls. A poll conducted by the Israeli newspaper Maariv, less than a week after the Hamas attack, showed that popular support for Netanyahu and his allies is collapsing. Voters are turning to Benny Gantz's National Unity Party, a center-right party, following his decision to join the government and form a war government.

The fact that Netanyahu, long mired in criminal cases and scandal, will not give up without a fight, has become clear in the month since October 7. In tweets that were later deleted, Netanyahu blamed the commander of the Israeli security forces for the mistakes that led to October 7, in an attempt to evade his responsibility.

Netanyahu's departure

Benny Gantz, a member of the war council formed by Netanyahu after the Al-Aqsa flood and the former Defense Minister, is considered the most prominent potential competitor to the current Israeli Prime Minister/Reuters

There were also allegations, since denied by Netanyahu, that during an off-camera press conference he linked the protest movement, in which thousands of reservists threatened to refuse to report for duty if the government carried out its highly controversial judicial reform, to Hamas' decision to attack.

Israel's Supreme Court has banned anti-war marches, but demonstrations by families of Hamas prisoners have been allowed outside Netanyahu's official residence, focusing attention on his handling of what has become Israel's most troubling emotional issue.

But he will not resign

Although Netanyahu, based on his past history, is unlikely to leave willingly and resign, calls for elections once the war against Hamas ends have continued in the past week, even within the war cabinet.

Labor Minister Yoav Ben Tzur of the Shas party said: “At the end of the war, Netanyahu will have to go to elections within 90 days.”

He added: "This will happen before an investigation committee of this or that kind is formed. This is my opinion." He continued, "We cannot continue like this. The public will have its say, and then we will see if Netanyahu gets the mandate."

For Dalia Sheindlin, a pollster, academic and columnist for Haaretz, the left is unlikely to benefit from any political reset. She said it was unlikely that either of the two left-wing parties, Labor and Meretz, would win enough votes to gain seats in the Knesset if elections were held next year.

The alternative may be more extreme

Although there is a possibility of forming a center-right coalition, the formation of a government more extreme than Netanyahu's is not ruled out.

Sheindlin added that even if there was a more centrist government, do not expect it to take a different approach to the Palestinian issue.

She said: “If a coalition led by someone like Benny Gantz emerges, it will not take a softer, more conciliatory line. It is very difficult to see a return to peace politics. My personal view is that the only thing that can mitigate the violence is international intervention, and this should be "The approach is imposed in some way."

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