Netanyahu gone, all eyes are now on PM Bennett
It was a new dawn for Israeli politics as a fragile coalition of eight parties took centre stage
JERUSALEM: Israel’s new Prime Minister Naftali Bennett got down to work on Monday at the head of a precarious coalition government that faces stark challenges, after 12 years under right-wing leader Benjamin Netanyahu.
The watershed moment saw an ideologically disparate eightparty bloc, ranging from right to left to Arab Islamic conservatives, band together in parliament on Sunday to unseat the battling veteran known as Bibi by a wafer-thin margin of 60 votes to 59.
Within hours Bennett, a tech millionaire and former special forces commander, was stepping into his new role, speaking with US President Joe Biden and receiving a briefing from national security adviser Meir Ben-shabbat.
Later on Monday, the 49-year-old’s first full day as Israel’s leader, he met his onetime ally Netanyahu as new ministers marked the beginning of Israel’s 36th government at the presidential residence.
In a statement, Biden said, “I look forward to working with Prime Minister Bennett to strengthen all aspects of the close and enduring relationship between our two nations. Israel has no better friend than the United States.”
In response, Bennett tweeted,
“I look forward to working with you to strengthen the ties between our two nations.”
But the potential for strain appeared on the horizon. Biden has encouraged the negotiation of a new nuclear deal with Iran, which Bennett promised in his speech to parliament he would staunchly oppose.
That vow was among the plans Bennett laid out that could be heard over rancorous jeers and shouts of “liar” and “criminal” from the Knesset, where many right-wing MPS are furious he joined forces with coalition architect Yair Lapid, a centrist.
Lapid, a 57-year-old former television presenter, is set to take over the premiership after two years serving as foreign minister - if the fragile coalition manages to hold onto power that long.
After four inconclusive elections in under two years, Bennett said the “time has come for different leaders, from all parts of the population, to stop, to stop this madness”.
Whether the bloc manages to keep power was an afterthought for many Israelis on Sunday night, with thousands clamouring into the streets to celebrate Bibi’s demise.
During his record-long tenure, Netanyahu became practically synonymous with Israeli politics, and for some young people the only leader they had known.
“This morning is the dawn of a new day,” said Ben Caspit, a Netanyahu biographer, in a column published in the Israeli outlets Maariv and Walla. “It is a morning of hard, sometimes Sisyphean work, to rebuild the ruins. Netanyahu and Bibi-ism were not defeated by the left or by the right, but by sanity, or at least by the yearning for sanity,” said Caspit.
WATCH: From millionaire techie to PM: Story of Naftali Bennett