Israel Faces New Political Turmoil

Jerusalem, Dec 23 (AFP/APP): Israel faces new political turmoil and a fourth election in less than two years after veteran Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s fractured ruling coalition failed to pass a budget bill early Wednesday.

His unhappy power-sharing deal with his former election rival, Defence Minister and Alternate PM Benny Gantz, struck in April, had been inching towards collapse for weeks, poisoned by mutual acrimony and mistrust.

It came to an end at midnight, forcing yet another unwanted election, on March 23, as Israel struggles with the Covid-19 pandemic and economic crisis, and as Netanyahu faces a string of hearings in his corruption trial.

In the looming election battle, Netanyahu is likely to tout his main diplomatic achievements, a series of US-brokered normalization deals with Arab states, but without the support of his close ally, US President Donald Trump, who will be replaced by Joe Biden on January 20.

The Knesset legislature was dissolved when the coalition headed by Netanyahu’s right-wing Likud and Gantz’s centrist Blue and White party missed a midnight deadline to pass a 2020 budget.

It marked the messy breakup of the troubled political marriage between the men who had faced off in three inconclusive elections, in April and September 2019 and March 2020.

Given Israel’s deep political divisions and the splintered electorate, it remains doubtful any single bloc or party will win a solid majority sufficient to form a stable government next time around.

“Israel’s ongoing political crisis will continue as long as Netanyahu remains prime minister and a government cannot be formed without him,” said Yohanan Plesner, head of the Israel Democracy Institute.

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