Fighting Back

At the heart of the problem is a breakdown of trust. “Stop treating me as an American agent,” Gantz said in an interview to right-wing Israeli broadcaster Channel 14. Netanyahu perceived Gantz as aiming to undermine him on behalf of the American administration, while Gantz felt that he was being left out of key decisions, most glaringly the hostage rescue operation.

Gantz called for snap elections, after which he would accept any result and seek to form a unity government. What Gantz didn’t reveal to interviewers in his recent media blitz is his compromise proposal to Netanyahu, dispatched through a war cabinet minister, with an agreed-upon date for elections and both men declaring ahead of time that they wouldn’t rule out sitting in a government led by the other, per the results of the election. The proposal was rejected by Netanyahu, who made clear his view that setting a date for elections during wartime is not an option.

Netanyahu is reluctant to fight a war at the head of a narrow right-wing government, but what he fears even more is that agreeing to elections at the expense of his right-wing allies would lead to the breakup of the right-wing bloc that has seen him through three transition governments, starting in 2019. In the post-October 7 reality, allying with an Arab party — as his opponents did in 2021 — doesn’t seem like an option. The scenario Netanyahu sees as most likely is no “total victory” for either bloc, but a return to the gridlock of the 2019–2022 political crisis.

Quickly urging Gantz to recant was Shas chairman Aryeh Deri, a member of the war cabinet and one of the government’s moderate voices who no longer intends to take part in war cabinet meetings after the departure of Gantz and his partner Gadi Eisenkot.