Hamas’s October 7th attack on Israel, during which more than fourteen hundred people were killed, has provoked significant anger at Benjamin Netanyahu, the country’s Prime Minister. More than half of Israelis believe that he should resign as soon as the war in Gaza is over, and almost nine in ten say that Hamas’s incursion represented a failure of his government’s leadership. But Netanyahu is also the great survivor of Israeli politics: after serving as Prime Minister for three years in the nineties, and then a dozen more starting in 2009, he returned—despite myriad legal troubles—in December as the head of the most right-wing government in the nation’s history.
I recently spoke by phone with Anshel Pfeffer, a columnist at Haaretz and the author of the (unauthorized) biography “Bibi,” about Netanyahu and his future. Pfeffer is currently covering the war and has been working on a book about Jewish fundamentalism. During our conversation, which has been edited for length and clarity, we discussed why Netanyahu’s long reign over Israeli politics may be coming to a close, the danger of a war leader who might lose power when the war ends, and the failure of his approach to Palestinians.
How would you describe this political moment in Israel, specifically for Netanyahu?
The fact that you are asking me a question about this as a political moment is very telling. It’s tragic that we are in the worst war that Israel’s been in for half a century, and while we’re talking about the military side, and the many Israeli families grieving, and obviously Israeli families worried for the sake of their loved ones, we are still gripped by the political fate of one man. It’s not just because so many are upset by him or love him but because his conduct during the last two weeks has been so political and is so obviously affected by his own narrow considerations, rather than what Israel needs right now.
How, during the last couple of weeks, has Netanyahu been behaving politically?
A lot is happening behind closed doors. His government has been trying to suppress reporting on the war. That, in itself, is obviously political. But the most overt ways have to do with how Netanyahu’s government is handling two of the most critical issues other than the actual war. One is civil relief for the tens of thousands of families who have been uprooted in Israel. Many of them have lost their homes and livelihoods. There is a very complex and major operation that should be under way, housing, trying to keep their businesses afloat, and whatever they need to keep their families alive. The actual effort has been smaller. Netanyahu’s staff has been unprofessional and refusing to work with people in the government who are known not to be supporters of Netanyahu or have taken part in protests against his government. This civil effort should be as important as the war effort.
The other issue is the families of the captives. Officially, Israel has recognized two hundred and ten captives being held by Hamas and other Palestinian organizations in Gaza. We are talking about people of all ages. Their families’ issues have been addressed very slowly. And Netanyahu didn’t even have a coördinator for P.O.W. affairs. For many years, Israeli governments have had someone who is designated as national coördinator for intelligence efforts, to try and locate these people, coördinate possible prisoner exchanges, and also is in contact with families. There’s always been somebody doing it. When Netanyahu returned to power at the end of December, the current person had retired. And, for nine months, he just didn’t appoint anybody.
All of a sudden, on October 7th, in addition to the already active P.O.W. and missing captives cases, there’s another two-hundred-plus. And then Netanyahu appointed probably one of the worst people possible for the position, a disgraced ex-general named Gal Hirsch. For many years, he was disgruntled with the way his military career ended, and job prospects didn’t materialize. He’s become one of the supporters of Netanyahu who hate the system and hate the civil service. And this is the guy Netanyahu has appointed to be the new coördinator.
What is the significance of Netanyahu appointing a war cabinet that includes some more centrist politicians?
What it means is that under a lot of public pressure, and pressure from some of his colleagues, the war cabinet now has people who have relevant experience and who until two weeks ago were members of the opposition. And that wasn’t easy. Netanyahu took days of convincing. What he refused to do—and this is the reason why Yair Lapid, who is the leader of the main party opposition, hasn’t joined the war cabinet—is to sideline the far-right ministers. Lapid said, “Look, I’m going to join the war cabinet; I want you to sideline the far-right ministers, because they’re causing a lot of harm.” Netanyahu refused to do that. He still thinks that they can save him after. This is the base that he still has, and therefore he’s not ready to fully broaden his cabinet so it can be a real emergency unity government.
There have been polls indicating that Israelis are furious with the Netanyahu government and Netanyahu himself, that they blame him in part for what happened, and that, when the war is over, they want a new Prime Minister. Is there a danger now that it’s in Netanyahu’s political interest to keep the war going for as long as he can?
It will be good for him to keep this twilight period going as long as possible, perhaps before and also after any ground campaign in Gaza, because at the end of the day, very few people—certainly no active politicians—are out there saying, “Netanyahu has to go right now.” There’s a feeling of responsibility—you can’t go changing the Prime Minister at a time of acute danger. So from his perspective, he’d certainly like to prolong that period.
But there are those who are also arguing that, actually, if Netanyahu wasn’t so engrossed in his political issues, maybe the I.D.F. would already be in Gaza. Somebody asked me the other day, “Does the fact that Benny Gantz and Gadi Eizenkot are more moderate, the fact that they’re part of the war cabinet—does that mean that the decisions on the war will be more moderate?” There is no correlation between those things. The fact that they’re more moderate in their politics doesn’t mean that their opinion is that this war should be pursued more moderately. They may well be much more forceful than what Netanyahu wants right now.
There is this image of Netanyahu as a warmonger, as such a nationalist that he therefore wants to use force all the time in this irresponsible way. And this is a total misunderstanding of Netanyahu. His nationalism does not necessarily translate into a desire to use the big armored divisions of the I.D.F. Netanyahu is not a fan of that type of war—and never was. Netanyahu doesn’t trust what some people call the big and stupid army. Netanyahu is the kind of guy who likes special forces, commando operations, secret units, and, if necessary, air power. He’s not a fan of these big division-size ground maneuvers, because he’s kind of a control freak and that’s the kind of war where you can lose control. He’s risk-averse. And on the political and personal level, he’s very distrustful of the generals, and he has been, basically, since he first became Prime Minister—when he was forty-six and his generals were this group of people who were older than him.
