On The Cusp of Another Mandate to Govern

"Benny Gantz does not deserve to be prime minister, he is weak, he has the most dictatorial party in the Knesset. I go to the citizens of Israel with a huge democratic majority. They hide his collaboration with Tibi [Joint List Israeli-Arab Knesset member Ahmad Tibi] from the public."
"I make the most cautious decisions and do not go to unnecessary wars. If we have no choice, we’ll hit Hamas in Gaza. I’m very, very careful before going to war because it’s a last resort."
"Since I am in charge of security, I decide on everything and take responsibility for it."
"Israel will do whatever it must do to defend ourselves and secure out future. I guarantee you, as long as I’m prime minister, Iran will never have nuclear weapons."
“I actually have faith in the Israeli courts, but the state’s witnesses against me have been blackmailed by threats."
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu

"I understand that people are sick of this [negative campaign] slime. … I intend to lead them on a new path."
"People understand that they cannot take the risk that Netanyahu will remain in power."
"I really hope the election result will be one that will allow me to form a unity government. This is the preferred alternative because this is what this society needs. Society is divided and needs healing."
"We will not establish a government with the Joint List or with its support — we have no agreement with anyone."
Benny Ganz, Leader, Blue & White party

The results of the exit polls are shown on a screen at Benny Gantz’s Blue and White party headquarters, following Israel’s parliamentary election, in Tel Aviv, Israel, Sept. 17, 2019. Photo: Reuters / Amir Cohen

"There is no sense of the end of times for Netanyahu -- he is fighting like someone who is still hungry."
"Wearing my academic's hat, I can tell you this: he is the best politician Israel has seen for a long time now."
Tamar Hermann, director, Guttmann Center for Public Opinion and Policy Research

"He's always been a political animal, and he has always fought tooth and nail for every possible vote."
"But he seems more motivated now -- with a real fire in his belly, perhaps because of his legal situation."
Dahlia Scheindlin, public opinion expert

He has served Israel well, in every Cabinet position he has ever held. Bearing in mind what a critically difficult task it is to steer and lead a country highly identifiable as different in a geography known for its prickly unrest, its monarchies and its tyrants, its sheikdoms and its plutocratic draw and its theocracies. Above all a geography held in thrall to Islam, tribal antipathies, sectarianism, ancient feuds, violence and jealousies and hatreds. And there is no discounting the fact that no other nation on Earth is faced with the double existential risk of Palestinian jihad.

Somehow, through four Likud administrations led by Benjamin Netanyahu he has managed to play his hand well on Israel's behalf; politically, socially, economically. Doing whatever has been necessary to ensure that the United States remains the power broker that Israel hugely depends upon at the United Nations yet brokering influence with Russia in maintaining a balance between the two world powers with their consuming interests in Middle Eastern and South Asian affairs.

He was to the campaign trail born, a challenge to whet his appetite for the balancing act of reaching out to hostile neighbours and not averse to any methods that prove useful, even while recognizing the dangers inherent in seeking peace with the Arab ruling class who themselves continue to foment hatred of Israel and Jews among their populations. He is dead-set determined to serve a fifth term as prime minister of Israel. Just as determined is the 20 percent of Israelis that are Arab, in removing him from office.

Accused of racism, of denigrating Israel's non-Jewish population, he is simply delivering an obvious message; although the country has accepted and given full equality under the law to non-Jews as Israeli citizens, Israel is by definition and intent, in reflection of its heritage and its modern history, a Jewish state. It represents a haven for Jews wherever they live; in Israel or within the vast diaspora. Knowing of Israel's existence assures Jews that another Holocaust cannot so easily re-occur.

 Trump and Netanyahu  Jan. 28, 2020, Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

Its enemies speak of it as an 'apartheid' state, but nowhere in the Middle East are Jews welcome to live among Arab Muslims; their heritage as Arab Jews was worthless when they were exiled by the Arab nations where they were born, lived and worked for a thousand years, only to return by forced necessity to their ancestral home in Israel. The Middle East, outside Israel, is Judenrein. But Israel, a Jewish state, has accepted non-Jews as citizens; the absolute and utter antithesis of apartheid.

Steps Netanyahu took through the Israeli Supreme Court to pass legislation to re-emphasize Israel's status in reality and intent as a Jewish state, is just one of many irritants to its Arab communities, and the Joint List -- comprised primarily of Arab-Israeli political parties joined by the Israel-Jewish left, both of which empathize more with the perceived needs of Palestinians than with Israel's security -- plot to remove him from power.

Yet speak to Palestinian Israelis of trading land with the Palestinians to give them Palestinian status and they're quick to assert continued Israeli status despite espousing Palestinian victimhood accusing Israel of 'occupation' resulting from ongoing Palestinian intent to destroy Israel. Palestinian Arab MKs have not been averse to conspiring on occasion with and supporting Hamas and Fatah, both of whose focus is on violently displacing Israel and killing Jews.

At age 70, Netanyahu has many good years of experience and intelligent moves to make on behalf of Israel. The criminal charges against him reflect poor judgement in some areas of his personal life linked to government, but look no further than Canada, or France, or Britain, and instances of criminal misdemeanor on the part of the ruling elite place them in questionable odour. Yet it is only in Israel where the law is applied with equal distinction at all levels of society that includes the head of government.

In the words of one member of Netanyahuy['s central committee of Likud, his "mood is exuberant -- bring another election, it's fine. At least  he lives to fight for another day", and Israel is the beneficiary. Israelis are understandably tired of elections; Tuesday's will be the third in the space of a year where the results left no clear winner and the excruciatingly difficult politics of building political alliances failed. In a way, this is in and of itself typical of Jewish individualism; quarrelsome and steeped in disagreement over sundry and all matters.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks from Israel via video link at the annual AIPAC conference in Washington on March 26, 2019. (Jim Watson/AFP)