At 12:41 p.m. on Wednesday, at least 40 members of Knesset pressed the button sending them to the unemployment office. The process of dispersing the Knesset is underway, and barring any dramatic surprises, will officially culminate next Monday or Tuesday as the country heads to another election. As a reminder, this will be the fifth general election in the past three years.
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When it comes to Israeli politics, we all know, that if anything bizarre and illogical can happen – it will. The Opposition, which worked, hoped, expected, and fought for an early election, is now doing everything in its power to avoid it from happening. The coalition, which did all it could to establish a government and prevent an early election, is now rushing to embrace elections.
Why is this happening?
Let's start with the Opposition. Benjamin Netanyahu, Moshe Gafni, and the rest are trying to avoid an election with every ounce of energy they can muster. They are even offering far-reaching deals to Benny Gantz, Gideon Sa'ar, and any other MK willing to enter an alternative government. Why? Because an election now is perilous to their political future. They went to the voting stations four times and failed each time to form a government. Even when the Likud entered an election race with historic peace agreements in tow and the first victory in the world against the coronavirus pandemic due to its vaccination policies – it failed to win.
From Netanyahu's perspective, the upcoming election is a matter of "win or go home." He knows that if he fails this time around, someone from his own party, and surely someone from the Haredi parties, will call on him to step aside to facilitate the establishment of a right-wing government without him. Otherwise, they will seek other options. Members of the Opposition would rather have a bird in their hand rather than two at the voting stations.
What's transpiring in the Israeli parliament right now is disconnected from all sound logic. The right has over 70 mandates; it should easily be able to govern. MKs with similar worldviews to colleagues with whom they even served in the same party not so long ago are performing political hara-kiri. The decision to embark on another election is utterly irrational and should be studied by psychologists. It is rooted in anger, revenge, mistrust, and more than a little personal animosity. Everyone knows that Gideon Sa'ar is mad at Netanyahu and that Benny Gantz doesn't trust him. An alternative government will never be formed under such circumstances, and the price, as usual, will be paid by us, the people.
The other side, the coalition, wants to disperse the Knesset as quickly as possible – quite hypocritically, it must be said. Yair Lapid doesn't want to wake up one morning and discover that instead of entering the Prime Minister's Office, an alternative right-wing government has been formed behind his back. He is ready to pay the price, even if it means failing to pass the so-called "defendant's bill" – which seeks to prevent a lawmaker facing criminal charges, in this case, Netanyahu, from forming a government.
Why is this hypocritical? Because members of this government have broken their promises, have done the opposite of what they said after looking straight into the camera, and have desecrated any ideology in which they draped themselves for the sake of one core vow – to prevent another election. Indeed, to prevent what they called immense chaos and harm to the country.
The seat, however, as we've already come to learn, is above all else.
