Inside Israel's military headquarters, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu watched the first release of hostages held by Hamas, while outside in a Tel Aviv square, their families rallied around Benny Gantz, his main rival for the top job.
Gantz, a former chief of staff and opposition leader who joined Netanyahu's war cabinet last month, asked the TV crew to leave him alone with his families. Photos released later showed him hugging individuals in the crowd.
Facing a huge wave of criticism for failing to prevent Hamas's shock incursion into Israel on October 7, Netanyahu has avoided public appearances as he wages a two-front war - one against the Palestinian group and the other for his own political survival.
The current war is further delaying his three-and-a-half-year corruption trial and an expected national inquiry into why Israel was caught off guard under his leadership.
Nicknamed Bibi, Netanyahu may be hoping to salvage his reputation by waging war and returning hostages while refusing to take responsibility. However, his biographer Anshel Pfeffer said: "No matter how long Netanyahu manages to hold on to power, he will not save his reputation." He is now irrevocably tainted by his failure to prevent the October 7 massacre”.
Pfeffer added that polls in recent weeks have shown that Israelis trust the security establishment when it comes to waging war, but not Netanyahu, writes Reuters.
"The failure of October 7 is his legacy. Whatever success Israel achieves after that will not be attributed to him”.
Since the beginning of the war, Israelis have mostly put aside party politics, but with the conclusion of the first phase of the action in Gaza, next week could mark the beginning of the potential end for Netanyahu, the "Politiko" portal assesses.
"Benni Gantz is the most likely challenger who will step forward and put an end to Netanyahu's long political career," Politiko states.
Before the attack, Gantz expressed concern about the dangerous "extremist" direction Netanyahu and his allies were taking the country, but after October 7 he was still willing to join Netanyahu's war cabinet for the sake of national unity. “There is a time for peace and a time for war. Now is the time for war," Gantz declared.
Since then, Gantz's result in the polls has risen sharply, while Netanyahu's has fallen to the lowest level in history, according to Politiko.
"The beginning of a political return to normal will happen the moment Gantz decides to leave the emergency cabinet," said Nimrod Goren, an academic and analyst at the Middle East Institute.
"It will be a momentous moment, when Beni decides to leave, and the public political discourse will change overnight," he said.
Reuters says the centrist Gantz, who spent nearly 40 years in the army, offers Netanyahu and his right-wing Likud party a more stable government that reduces the influence of far-right and religious coalition partners on the fringes of Israeli society.
However, while they may be united in war, they disagree politically.
Gantz this week strongly opposed the unfreezing of hundreds of millions of shekels in political funds earmarked for ultra-Orthodox and right-wing parties that support Israeli settlement expansion. Gantz announced on Sunday that five of his party's ministers would vote against the budget changes, and in a letter to Netanyahu he criticized "the payment of coalition funds or any additional budget unrelated to the war effort or the promotion of economic growth."
Netanyahu, Gantz and a third member of the war cabinet, current Defense Minister Yoav Galant, who was fired by Netanyahu last March over opposition to his controversial effort to weaken the independence of the judiciary, are struggling to rein in their outsized egos and control strong personal animosity. Despite this, government meetings are often noisy, two Israeli officials with access to the sessions told Politico. They insisted on remaining anonymous.
Similarly, while refusing to join a government of national unity, former prime minister Yair Lapid, leader of the centrist Yesh Atid party, the largest parliamentary opposition faction, was cautious about any move. Until mid-November, he avoided joining a handful of mostly fringe politicians and former prime ministers in calling on Netanyahu to resign and take responsibility for the failure to prevent Hamas attacks. On November 15, he finally called on Netanyahu to step down. When Likud attacked him, he retorted sharply that he wanted a new prime minister, not necessarily a new ruling party.
Politiko writes that Netanyahu is struggling to maintain the discipline of his ultra-right coalition partners. Some of them advocate increasingly extreme policies, including blocking all humanitarian aid to Gaza, annexation of the Strip and even nuclear attack.
Two-thirds of Israelis want the country to be led by anyone other than Netanyahu
Netanyahu himself has been accused of political smearing after issuing a series of statements blaming Israel's military and intelligence chiefs for failing to prevent the October 7 attack. Security chiefs accepted their share of the blame, but Netanyahu did not, saying what went wrong would be assessed later, presumably in the hope of recovering his approval ratings.
Two-thirds of Israelis want anyone but Netanyahu to lead the country, and one widespread accusation against him is that he has failed to become a true national leader and that he has put maintaining a coalition government - loyal to religious nationalists and extremist settler groups - above the national interest. Hence, as "Politiko" points out, the indignation over the unfreezing of funds for ultra-Orthodox purposes and illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank.
"However, for the sake of national unity and out of caution towards Netanyahu's political skills and his history of returning despite seemingly no chances, his political opponents are currently patiently waiting for the right moment to challenge him," the analysis of the Brussels portal points out.
Reuters writes that Gantz does not have as much experience or style on the world stage as Netanyahu, and that critics interpret his relaxed demeanor as a lack of determination and principle. Ganz described himself as more persistent than likable.
Gantz is often seen as just as belligerent to the Palestinians as Netanyahu and has refrained from making any promises about the statehood they seek, but has in the past supported efforts to restart peace talks with them.
Behind the scenes, opposition parties are lobbying a dozen moderate deputies from Netanyahu's Likud party to see if they would support a vote of no confidence, Politiko writes. He adds that the opposition leaders also spoke with Shasa, a Sephardi Haredi party, which is center-left on fiscal issues but conservative when it comes to religious and social policy. It is the fourth largest party in the Knesset.
Protest movement
"Politico" also writes that the leaders of the protest movement, which gathers more than 200 groups that opposed Netanyahu's controversial reform of the judiciary, are considering when they should restart actions with the aim of ousting him. For much of this year, the movement, which includes retired generals, judges, business leaders and reservists, has occasionally rocked Israel, bringing the country to a standstill.
However, after October XNUMX, attention shifted to assisting the evacuation, the families of those kidnapped and those killed by Hamas, and providing support to communities in southern Israel. They are now starting to think about when to organize street protests again.
They fear that if they don't take action, Netanyahu could survive, said Shikma Bresler, a physicist and mother of five daughters, who became one of the most recognizable faces of the protests after leading a mile-long column of protesters from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
"If we do nothing, it could happen that everyone leaves except him, that all the heads of the security agencies and the military resign, and he stays in office and continues to appoint his unqualified people to all positions, which would be a disaster," she said. Bresler for Politico.
"Some claim that it won't happen and that Bibi is finished, but I say that we don't know and we can't risk it," she added. Bresler pointed out that the movement last time brought hundreds of thousands of people to the streets - about two million people protested on one occasion.
"Scientific literature says that the magic number of participants needed for a protest to be successful is about 3,5 percent of the population. We had more than 20 percent of the residents actively involved. It was a great awakening of normal, ordinary people in this country," she added.
"This time it will be even bigger".
Bonus video:
