The world is well into another “strongman” era, leaving little room for principled leadership, well-meaning negotiations, or reasonable compromise. Hopefully, Netanyahu loses followed by Trump signaling a beginning of the end of this phase in history.
Wanna-Be Dictators of the world, Unite!
The Israeli election is quite interesting. There are two equally plausible ways to look at the election, each of which produces a starkly different result.
If you look at this election in terms of comparing the parties that currently form part of Netanyahu’s governing coalition vs. the field, the average across all polls taken since the beginning of the campaign and, separately, the average across polls taken over the last 10 days, puts Netanyahu’s governing coalition at 57 seats which is 4 short of what is needed for absolute majority (61 seats out of 120 total in the Knesset). That trend line has been very consistent. The trend at the beginning of last week was more weighted to the opposition. The trend over the last 3 or 4 polls has been towards Netanyahu, but the overall balance is basically the same.
However, if you look at this election in terms of ideology: Center/left vs. Center-Right/Far Right, Netanyahu potentially fares a lot better, with center right and far right parties collecting 66 seats on average (5 more than what is needed for an absolute governing majority).
This is where it gets interesting. The Blue-White coalition of Gantz/Lapid has consistently been 2-4 seats ahead of Likud and based on current trends would be the largest single party. There are a number of center-right parties and center-right pols (like Gantz) who have left the Netanyahu government, the Likud Party, or a coalition party. In short, over the past 3-5 years, Netanyahu has shed people from the center-right and has had to lean on the far right to maintain a good shot to win an absolute governing coalition majority.
So, if Gantz’s party were to win the most seats, there is a very decent possibility that the currently independent center-right parties would choose to form a coalition with him and his Blue-White party. One of those parties is Zehut, a weird libertarian party that is campaigning on pot legalization, pro-marriage equality, privatization, flat taxes, against the two-state solution (and pro-annexation of the occupied territories) and also against all US aid to Israel. Their founder, Moshe Feiglin, has beef with Bibi as Bibi essentially pushed him out of Likud years ago. He is open to forming a coalition with anyone and is more focused on his domestic priorities. Yes, this is a weird bunch, but Zehut is on track to get 3-5 seats in the polls and this pro-pot party might decide the fate of the Middle East.
This is where the presence of Gantz gets really interesting. While Netanyahu is trying to paint him as crazy and unfit and the pro-netanyahu Israeli media is intentionally diminishing all talk of Bibi’s criminal indictments and promoting whatever garbage he can throw at Gantz, Gantz has real credibility among center-right voters as a former head of the IDF. If he were to beat Netanyahu on Election Day, it is quite plausible that the uncommitted parties would grant him legitimacy to try to build a coalition and form a new government. If you think that’s strange, just look to NZ. Jacinda Ardern brought Labour back to contention in 2017 but her party did not win a majority and they were not the largest single party at the end of their last election. The National Party won the most seats and got 9% higher vote share than Labour (but not enough to form a governing majority). However, Labour’s gain of 14 seats in the Parliament was all the rage and the far right NZ First Party decided to form a coalition with Labour, which seemed really odd but it has worked out. We’ll see what happens. The election is in about 9 days or so.
Headline: “Israeli PM Netanyahu welcomes ‘The Boys From Brazil’”
Self-righteous, right wing megalomaniacs love one another.
As Archie Bunker once asked “Is Martin Borman still down there”.
Oh Lookey-Here! 
!
Isreali’s very own President-for-life, Papa-Doc Netanyahu, meeting the newest member of Emerging-World-Tyrants Club.
…The Universe must weep at the next gathering of these slithering murtherfuckers, that’ll include crown-prince MBS and our very own mushroom d*cked, Agent-Orange.
“The Brazilian leader opened his speech after landing with the words “I love Israel” in Hebrew”.
“My government is firmly decided to strengthen the partnership between Brazil and Israel,” Bolsonaro added.
bookmarking
Hopefully this backfires on Netanyahu…Israel is very LGBT friendly, a significant people are gay/lesbian, so hosting a known bigot is not going to be seen in a good light. The question is if that drives enough voters to the polls against Likud; the Middle East would be better off if a non-authoritarian was running Israel instead of Bibi and his minions.
Thanks for that insightful summary. I’ve been too mired in monitoring our mishegas and the spectacle that is Brexit to pay sufficient attention to Israel. The comparison to NZ is really interesting.
Q: What do you call five would-be Tyrants at the bottom, of the sea?
A: A good start.
right after he met with the CIA, wonder what they taled about?
Like flies on shit.
Authoritarians delighted with each other. Completely unpredictable!
I hope it does, but I doubt many LGBTQ+ Israelis are supporters of Likud or any of its coalition partners.
It could drive turnout, maybe. Last election the desperate last-minute election day Likud texts went out: “The Arabs Are Voting!” (This was, of course, a horror to the Likudniks.) This time around they’ll probably go with “The Queers Are Voting!”
Their stock in trade.
Netanyahu, Trump and Bolsonaro: a fascist circle-jerk…
Sounds an awful lot like how our election will go in 2020. Just replace all the Netanyahu references with Trump and Israeli media with American MSM and it’s a mirror image.
"While Trump is trying to paint him as crazy and unfit and the pro-Trump American media is intentionally diminishing all talk of Donald’s criminal indictments and promoting whatever garbage he can throw at [name your Democratic candidate for Pres)…
It’s all the same stuff, different country.