Naftali Bennett finds himself in the place many good people before him have. To hear the TV news reports and the big headlines of most major media outlets tell it, the "alternative" government, the one Bennett heads as Netanyahu goes home, is already established and ready to go. A few more small things have to be worked out, and then it's a matter of waiting patiently until Netanyahu's mandate to form a government runs out in another week and a half, and it's done.
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The hero of the day is, of course, Bennett, just like Moshe Kahlon was back in the day or Gideon Sa'ar was until not too long ago. And of course Benny Begin, Avigdor Lieberman, and all the rest of the people on the Right who garnered some media light when they began attacking Netanyahu and plotting moves against him.
Bennett is now being hoisted aloft like he never has before. Not only by the media, but by senior politicians from the Left who are hoping to see Bennett become prime minister as badly as devout Jews pray for the Messiah. They never voted for him, or considered doing so. Their opinions are as far apart from his as east is from west, and still, they have found their savior. And the PR blitz is underway.
Bennett's dilemma is very real. Unlike all the other right-wing politicians who came before him, the Yamina leader has a chance of becoming prime minister two weeks from now, a privilege they didn't have. Bennett always dreamed of becoming prime minister. All he needs to do to make it a reality is to go back on the principles he has held since he entered politics and lean into the warm embrace of his former opponents and future partners. They will make sure that nothing bad happens to him, that every negative report or reminder of things he said in the not-too-distant past about working with Yair Lapid, Meretz, the Arab parties, won't make it past sectarian and fringe news outlets, and he will be allowed to storm ahead and form the government they want.
After he does the work and storms the fort, it will be another story. The need for the Yamina leader will plummet, and at every crisis – and God willing there will be many – he will find himself facing down a leftist majority in his government with the backing and help of flattering journalists, of whom there will be fewer.
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