The planning of Benjamin Netanyahu's political struggle is transparent. He will grip his adversaries with two arms: the poison machine that is constantly operating will place the responsibility for the events of October 7, 2023 on the IDF and the Shin Bet, while he will set up some kind of commission of inquiry, which will be dated with chatter like the court hearing the criminal indictment against him. Time will take its course, as if "his time has passed without his sacrifice," and his reign will continue as before.
With him also aids, political field artillery: several nights a week he conquers the screen at the head of a trio. Bibi wins, Yoav Galant and Benny Gantz remain hunched over in their seats while he is high on the podium. Sometimes he even slips away in the dark of night in a black shirt, there is and smiles as a conductor and some look mourning, and "the whole world is a stage" in the words of William Shakespeare, and it is only his, the soloist.
Everything seemed within reach to him, and yet - he will not rise and will not be. There have been things before. 50 years and a day before Netanyahu's collapse, the devastation of the Yom Kippur War struck Israel. Although after about 20 days we threw golden apples at the besieged Egyptian Third Army soldiers, and a failed start to the fighting turned into a glorious victory, Golda Meir was forced to resign. It could not evade responsibility for disrupting any negotiations to prevent the war in advance.
She didn't want to quit either. At the end of December 1973, when some 2,200 dead had already been counted and the war with Syria had not yet ended, it won an unprecedented victory in the elections for the 8th Knesset: the Labor faction came to power with 51 seats.
Still, in April – nine months before the state commission of inquiry headed by Supreme Court President Shimon Agranat finished its work – Meir was forced to put the keys on the table. Her successor, Yitzhak Rabin, formed his first government. Meir and Moshe Dayan and Abba Eban were absent.
The same will happen to Netanyahu. One day, Kaplan Square will be filled with demonstrators, and what appeared in the previous round to be a peak gathering will be considered an amateur preview compared to the earthquake that will hit the country.
Who decides when "the waters are easy and the land will be seen" and the war behind and the demonstration here? Maybe Joe Biden? Maybe Benny Gantz is quitting the worm coalition? Or perhaps the public itself spontaneously, as happened on the night Netanyahu plotted to oust Galant and was knocked to the planks, in the Naomi Shemer method - "when you start walking, it starts walking"?
Netanyahu must not delude himself.
No one will wait for the commission of inquiry. Nor did the heads of the defense establishment, who, unlike him, honestly accepted responsibility for the national crisis. They will wait only until he resigns with them, and will not let him take their place with his will-making rhinos.
The Likud, which is hesitant to oust him, will choose his successor with a trembling of fingers, and a government will be formed until the end of the Knesset's term. Likud without him.
He should retire on time. Because he doesn't know where he's headed anyway. The day before yesterday, he extended the ceasefire by two days, and declared that he would topple Hamas and return all the hostages, and while it is possible that he will succeed, it is not inconceivable that he will not reach his goal in either way. Salami ceasefires are dangerous.
No one will wait for the commission of inquiry. Nor did the heads of the defense establishment, who, unlike him, honestly accepted responsibility for the national crisis. They will wait only until he resigns with them, and will not let him take their place with his will-making rhinos
The Economist is a sensible weekly that is cool and level-headed and unsentimental, neither inflammatory nor projecting defeatist depression, and its editorial, calling for Netanyahu's dismissal, said as it was: A ceasefire is the enemy of peace because it would allow Hamas to continue to rule over Gaza.
For the time being, Yahya Sinwar continues to control the core of the Gaza Strip. Even visited the abductees. It will pull Israel to the last abductees.
Then he will be arrested, leaving in captivity about ten Gilad new rulers. And the Netanyahu family will settle in a villa in Caesarea or Gaza Street in Jerusalem, and perhaps across the ocean.
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