Israel’s government coalition remains a highly volatile partnership. The latest example was seen this week when the country avoided the fourth new election in two years at the last minute.

Major Instability Still Remains

However, with the postponement of the budget dispute, the next round in the ongoing battle between Benjamin Netanyahu and Benny Gantz is just that: postponed, not overcome nor canceled. With it, the next conflict is already waiting.

The coalition’s volatility between Prime Minister Netanyahu’s Likud and Gantz’s Blue & White had been anticipated when both agreed to the terms of their forced partnership. Accordingly, there has now been an ongoing dispute among both parties since they took office on May 17.

This week, it nearly ended the coalition, in which case the Israelis would have cast their votes for the fourth time in just two years.

The Budget Dispute

Specifically, the dispute was about the country’s budget—the coalition agreement provided for adopting a budget for the rest of this year and next year. However, Netanyahu and his Likud claimed that this would tie the government’s hands in urgent action to help the economy, which has been hurt due to the coronavirus pandemic. Netanyahu stuck to his position. Gantz, who opposed it, also remained tough.

The reason for this is that Netanyahu and Gantz are concerned with their political future. In Israel, there are automatically new elections if the deadline does not pass the budget. Unlike in other cases of failure of the current coalition, Netanyahu would thus remain in office.

The approval of the budget for the coming year is, therefore, a reassurance for Gantz that Netanyahu, as agreed in the coalition agreement, will hand over the baton to him in November 2021. Literally, at the last minute, both sides agreed on a bill that postpones the deadline for adopting the budget by three months and thus provides both a respite. The new deadline is now December 23.

Is it Really a Co-Equal Coalition Government?

The deep distrust between Netanyahu and Gantz suggests that the issue will remain, despite the postponement, which, by no means, will mitigate the current circumstances in Israel. While Netanyahu and Gantz are equal partners on paper, Blue and White remain the minority partner. The party not only has fewer parliamentary seats than the Likud, but the public does not credit Gantz’s willingness to compromise. Instead, he is criticized as a man without a backbone. Meanwhile, Netanyahu is doing everything possible to present himself as Israel’s unilateral answer to a greater future.

The most recent example of this is the normalization agreement with the United Arab Emirates. Gantz and Foreign Minister Ashkenazi only found out about this when President Trump spread the news on Twitter. Instead of admitting to the two that they were correct in their line of balancing with countries in the region over the planned annexation of parts of the West Bank, Netanyahu said he had not informed the two because he was afraid they might do something leak to the public.

Had Netanyahu let the coalition collapse, an expensive and challenging election campaign would likely have overshadowed his Emirates’ success. In addition to the COVID-19 crisis, that was arguably another reason why he finally agreed to the postponement.

The Threat of New Elections Still Remains

However, the threat of new elections has not disappeared and Netanyahu will do everything possible to maintain his power and attempt to circumvent the agreement of having Gantz becoming his successor.

He is still on trial for corruption charges and can no longer avoid the latter. However, by staying in power, he could severely lengthen the process and influence a potential jail sentence by appointing posts such as attorney general and police chief.

Blue and White, and above all, Justice Minister Avi Nissenkorn, whose prerogative is filling such vacancies, are currently standing in the way of such an approach. For the time being, Likud has stipulated that the picks will be made by a committee that also includes Likud representatives. The decision on the exact composition remains pending for now.

Israel’s government is, therefore, far from being out of the woods.

L'articolo Israel Avoids Yet Another Crisis – For Now proviene da InsideOver.

Benjamin Netanyahu has not been called “the Magician” for nothing. Each time the Israeli prime minister found himself with his back against the wall, he was somehow able to turn things around and escape.

Netanyahu’s Latest Gambit

This month, the odds seemed to be entirely against him: Israel is facing another rise in COVID-19 cases, combined with a growing economic crisis and an unprecedented judicial dilemma, evolving around the premier’s refusal to resign after he had been indicted for three counts of corruption.

But as always, Netanyahu seems to have found a way out. His dramatic announcement of a new “normalization” agreement between Israel and the United Arab Emirates took on-watchers by surprise. The deal had been reached secretly, with only a few key advisors on each side – and the Trump administration as a go-between – knowing what was about to happen.

Netanyahu’s Recent Victory

Netanyahu, it appears, took pleasure in the drama. He abruptly cut short a coronavirus cabinet meeting on Thursday, August 13, telling participants that an “urgent national matter” had demanded his attention and “pretty soon you’ll know”. His new, probably temporary, partners from the Blue and White party did not know anything, although its leaders serve as alternate prime minister, defense minister and foreign minister in the national unity government.

Even Israel’s intelligence community had been mostly kept in the dark. The prime minister acted by his own. He brokered a deal: full normalization between the two countries, in return for a few years (and probably permanent) postponement of his plan to annex the Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

In this, Netanyahu achieved two main long-term strategic goals, if you’d like – two important pillars of his regional policy: proving that the ongoing conflict with the Palestinians will not prevent further agreement with Sunni-Arab nations and upgrading the alliance against Iran’s attempts of reaching domination in the Middle East. At first, it seemed to be a win-win situation for Netanyahu: he could finally present the Israeli public with a surprise achievement, which would divert some of the attention from his mishandling of the virus; he would improve Israel’s strategic situation by strengthening the relationship with one of the wealthiest and most important countries in the Middle East; and he would also abort his ill-conceived annexation plan, which the Unites States was not going to support anyway.

But things are never that simple with Netanyahu. In the beginning, the Israeli media, at least, looked thrilled to finally deal with something different than counting hospital beds and pandemic fatalities. TV reporters were quickly dispatched to Dubai and Abu-Dhabi, to present the Israelis with the wonders of oil super-wealth and tourism at close to 50 degrees Celsius in the shade. Studio pundits took pleasure in repeating their amazement at Netanyahu-the-statesman. Only he, they claimed, could achieve such a remarkable feat, which relied on his deep understanding of the region’s intricate mechanisms and his close relationship with US President, Donald Trump.

The Darker Sides of the Deal Emerge Piece by Piece

Yet pretty soon, matters turned out worse for the prime minister. First, many of his hardcore ideological backers from the settler movement criticized him for deserting the divine vision of annexation for such short-term goals as an agreement with another Arab nation. Then, another secret was exposed. It turned out that the Emiratis were not only interested in halting annexation and paving the way for more technology and weapon deals with the Israelis (much of these happen anyway, for years, even without a formal relationship).

There had been another important reason for the historic agreement. For more than a decade, the UAE’s leaders have been trying to persuade the Obama administration and then the Trump administration to sell them ultra-sophisticated weapons systems. In particular, the Gulf state was interested in F-35 fighter jets and various kinds of attack UAVs. But there was always a problem.

The United States is committed, by stated policy and also by law, to maintain Israel’s Qualitative Military Edge. According to this policy, different administrations, from Jonson and Nixon onwards, refused to sell certain modern systems to Arab countries, sometimes even after those countries signed peace agreements with Israel. This time, the UAE was hoping Israel would turn a blind eye. Trump, it turns out, was on board. A few days after the announcement about the agreement he remarked that the Sheikhs were negotiating a massive deal, which would probably include the stealth F-35 planes (he then went on to discuss the virtues of American pilots, who apparently were better looking than Tom Cruise of “Top-Gun” fame).

Critics: Netanyahu Misleading the Nation

This was classic Netanyahu. When the Israeli press first reported a possible weapons deal, he vehemently denied and even accused the journalists of spreading “Fake News”. Israel, the prime minister maintained, opposed such a deal and the agreement does not include a secret understanding regarding the F-35. But that, precisely, is the point. The American QME rules do not give Israel a veto power over weapon deals.

They just state that an American President should first consult the Israeli government before deciding. This, in essence, is what Trump was saying – and why Netanyahu came onboard. Yet again, this fact was portrayed as not speaking truth to the Israeli public.

Pretty soon, Netanyahu’s political opponents caught up and began accusing the prime minister of misleading the nation. The sense of pleasant surprise had quickly evaporated. Then, demonstrations demanding the PM’s resignation resumed all over the country. At this point, one would gather that Israelis are more consumed by financial and health struggles than by plans for visiting desert tourist sites, using money they don’t currently have to pay for plane tickets on airplanes they will probably not be allowed to board, because of Israel’s stature as a COVID-19 hotspot.

Netanyahu, it seems again, is still not safe from his political worries, or from his legal troubles

L'articolo Netanyahu’s Latest Trick proviene da InsideOver.