Likud, Religious Zionist, and Ultra-Orthodox (Haredi) politicians are exulting in the apparent downfall of the Bennett-Lapid government.
Nevertheless, I sense that the Bennett-Lapid government answers the desire of many Israelis for leadership that is neither radical left nor radical right, neither anti-religious nor obnoxiously religious-coercive, neither feeble nor fierce. And it has real achievements.
The complicated and bifurcated government passed a responsible budget for the first time in four years, which deregulated important sectors of the economy while investing in healthcare, education, and defense without significantly raising taxes.
Religious Affairs Minister Matan Kahana's nascent restructuring of the kashrut and conversion systems, and the government's proposed changes in military draft law relating to Haredi yeshiva students, are very important too. (I am hopeful that some of Kahana's adjustments will stick, even if he doesn't have the chance to fully implement them.)
And in this regard, who wants a reprise of the Netanyahu-Haredi governments of the past decade? Who wants another Netanyahu government anchored by cantankerous Haredi politicians who will seek to roll back Kahana's necessary adjustments in matters of religion and state? Who wants to see another set of narrow-minded Haredi chief rabbis elected in 2023? I don't.
The Bennett-Lapid government also has demonstrated that there is life for Israel on the diplomatic stage after Benjamin Netanyahu. Foreign and defense policy doomsday did not descend upon Israel following Netanyahu's departure from Balfour – as Netanyahu and his followers stridently warned.
Of course, it was predictable that Israel's enemies would act to test its new leaders and to upset the Abraham Accords momentum, which explains the current wave of Palestinian terrorism.
But Bennett has demonstrated principled continuity in Israeli foreign and defense policy. He swiftly stepped into Netanyahu's big shoes and maintained diplomatic momentum, while improving Israel's ties to Jordan, Egypt, and the US.
Bennett also reignited a discourse of respect and appreciation in Israel-Diaspora relations, without backing away from his right-wing and religious principles.
As for Likud's slogans of delegitimization against the government – mainly that it relied for support on the anti-Zionist Islamists of Ra'am (The United Arab List), meaning that Bennett has no right to be prime minister – well, this too is poppycock. It was Netanyahu who first proposed bringing Ra'am into government as a Likud coalition partner.
Most of all, the Bennett-Lapid government has brought stability and sanity to Israeli politics for a decent period. Indeed, bringing about a climate of relative internal political calm has been the greatest contribution of this government.
The coalition may be an incongruous creation stemming from force majeure. But the restraining of Israel's raging political fevers after 32 months of furious campaigning is a good thing. And Israel needs more it. Israeli politics needs more such healing time. It still needs fetters on its political passions, which have gone wildly out of whack.
A September 2022 election that will be bitterly and vitriolically fought and yet most probably will lead to another political stalemate – is the last thing that Israel needs.
Of course, there are question marks hanging over this government's performance relating to the struggle against Iran and against hostile Palestinians. It remains unclear whether Bennett was prepared to act in defiance of American and world opinion and to actively sabotage the imminent Western nuclear sell-out to the Iranians.
And his government has failed to preserve what is left of Israel's de facto sovereign control in Area C of Judea and Samaria. It has not dismantled illegal Bedouin and Palestinian settlements that purposefully impinge on strategic routes, nor strengthened Israeli settlement in the Jerusalem envelope and other critical/consensus areas.
Nevertheless, I think that the Bennett-Lapid government (for at least the remainder of Bennett's scheduled term) is worth saving, somehow.
David M. Weinberg is a senior fellow at The Kohelet Forum and Habithonistim: Israel's Defense and Security Forum. His diplomatic, defense, political, and Jewish world columns over the past 25 years are archived at www.davidmweinberg.com. This article represents the author's personal views, not his institutional affiliations.
