Ehud Yaari: “Dangerous Curve” for Israel ahead, post-election

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Eminent Israeli journalist Ehud Yaari joined the latest Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council (AIJAC) webinar, to discuss “Israel’s Election and the New Netanyahu Government”.

Ehud Yaari

Yaari noted this is not a new turning point, but “we are definitely approaching a dangerous curve along the road,” because a different brand of Zionism will be a senior government partner. Religious Zionism, he explained, represents a “Halachic, Messianic Zionism”.

Yaari said he is not sure Netanyahu is “extremely happy about it” – he has previously refused to be photographed with Religious Zionism leader Itamar Ben Gvir – but he will have in senior positions people “who didn’t mourn the assassination” of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.

Netanyahu’s instinct, he said, is to seek allies on his left, but he had no choice this time. He added that all from Religious Zionism oppose the Oslo Accords and protested against the Gaza disengagement. They listen to rabbis “from the extreme end of the spectrum of the religious establishment.”

Yaari explained the Netanyahu bloc received only slightly more overall votes than its opposition, but the centre-left wasted 400,000 votes – eight per cent of all those cast – because Meretz and one Arab party didn’t make the threshold for Knesset membership, adding that Labor barely got there. The Israeli left, he said, has been wiped out, and won’t recover without a different form, leadership and agenda.

He said Netanyahu intends to have a government of 30 ministers, but keep some portfolios open in case MKs from the other camp join at some time. The three main possibilities are Ra’am, whose leader Mansour Abbas wants to look after Israeli Arabs, but who Ben-Gvir and Smotrich would likely not accept, Avigdor Lieberman and Gideon Saar.

All parties in the new government are committed to reforming the judicial system, Yaari explained, including involving politicians more in nominating judges, and allowing the Knesset to overrule judicial decisions.

However, he added, ending Netanyahu’s criminal trial is no longer an objective, because it will last at least two or three years, Netanyahu has been excused from attending, and the progress of the trial indicates the prosecution will have trouble proving bribery.

Netanyahu, he said, knows he needs to prove he can tame Ben Gvir and Smotrich, or they will come to be seen as spokesmen for Israel, and if they are perceived as having a major role, it will impact how Israelis and Israel’s allies see his government.

On the Palestinian issue, he said, Smotrich and Ben Gvir’s platform is to annex the West Bank and then allow the Palestinians there to decide whether they want to remain as residents and have semi-autonomy.

Yaari said he had personally been vehemently against the Oslo Accords, as he knew Yasser Arafat, whose character made it obvious it wouldn’t work, but sliding into a one-state solution, where Israel has a 35% to 45% Arab minority, would be unacceptable. So although there is no chance of peace with the current Palestinian leadership, Israel must keep the two-state peace slogan alive and do all it can not to change the lay of the land in the West Bank. Otherwise, Israel will lose the Abraham Accords. The UAE doesn’t care about the Palestinians but needs to be able to claim that its relations with Israel are helping achieve a Palestinian state.

Yaari has no doubt Netanyahu would like to have Ra’am in his coalition. It is symbolically and politically very important as the first Arab party that wants to be politically integrated. Mansour Abbas says he knows Israel is a Jewish state. Rejecting him would send his supporters back to the anti-Israel Arab parties.

The relationship with Israel’s Arabs, he said, is the business of the prime minister, so Netanyahu should make every effort to get Ra’am into the governing coalition. There are, he added, two contradictory sentiments among the Arab community – nationalistic pro-Palestinian, and Israeli. They even speak Hebrew when travelling. A Hamas leader recently wrote an article urging Israeli Arabs to stop identifying as Israeli when abroad. So while there were riots during the May 2021 Gaza conflict, there is another side that can be worked with.

He also said he doubts Yair Lapid can form a configuration on the centre-left capable of winning an election in future. The Israeli electorate has moved to the right.

He explained that those who voted for Religious Zionism were settlers who previously supported Naftali Bennett, some from Likud, and some from centre parties reacting to the deterioration in security in the south where some Bedouin are running riot, and to the daily terror attacks in the West Bank and Jerusalem.

People, he said, felt Netanyahu was a safe pair of hands. On fighting terror, his effort will be to get Mahmoud Abbas to change the PA Government to one willing to start building an economy, institutions and services rather than just expanding the public service. Netanyahu should then get the Gulf states to mend fences with the PA and accelerate moves for the PA to take wanted terrorists into custody and confiscate their weapons in return for removing them from the wanted list of those to be tracked down. This would reduce the scope and incidence of attacks. He doubts settlement policy will change under the new government.

Yaari also said Israelis don’t understand why the Australian Government decided to no longer recognise west Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, as even Palestinians accept it will remain part of Israel. It is taken as sending a signal that relations will be less friendly than under the previous government.

An upcoming major task for Israel, Yaari said, will be housing up to 250,000 Russian and Ukrainian immigrants. The Jewish Agency’s troubles in Russia started before the Ukraine war, but are one reason Israel won’t provide Ukraine with missile defence systems. Militarily, Israel can handle what Russia has left in Syria, but doesn’t want to pick a fight with Russia, which allows Israel to strike Iranian assets in Syria.

He says there is no chance Netanyahu will cancel the Lebanon maritime agreement – the negotiations started when he was PM – but questions what will happen if it turns out there is no gas in the Lebanese areas.

Yaari expressed doubt about Iran’s claim it has developed hypersonic missiles. It will supply Russia with short and medium-range missiles and drones. Russia also wants cruise missiles, as it is running out. He warns that in return, Putin may help Iran upgrade its air force, tanks and “ancient” navy, which the JCPOA allows, and which would mean a very different Iran. Iran’s drones have proven more vulnerable than previously thought, he added, but all their engine parts were smuggled from the West, despite sanctions.

He said the current protests in Iran are not an immediate danger to the regime but have been a daily event for six weeks, moving through various cities and sectors of the population, and what is important is that ethnic minorities are on the streets and killing IRGC members, so it is becoming serious.

He added that there is enormous tension between Iran and Azerbaijan, which is also Shi’ite, but secular, with 20 million Azeris living in Iran. Both countries are holding military drills on the border, and Azerbaijan is beginning to campaign for the Azeri provinces to secede. Thus, there has not been an eruption, but the protests are expanding and resilient, which is ominous for the regime.

Netanyahu, Yaari said, wants to invest substantial effort into his relationship with US President Joe Biden, which is already good, and will continue trying to improve his standing among left-wing Democrats. He will also try to speed up normalisation with Saudi Arabia, which is making progress. Israeli athletes and chess players are going there, the Saudis have lots of ideas for collaboration, and Netanyahu has good relations with Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman.

He added that Netanyahu will also make efforts with sub-Saharan Africa, hoping to achieve normalisation with Muslim countries such as Burkina Faso, Niger and Mali, having already started with Chad and achieved normalisation with Sudan. This would allow direct flights to Latin America. Japan and India, whose Prime Minister Modi congratulated Netanyahu in Hebrew, will also be priorities (but probably not China) so Netanyahu will have a full plate on foreign policy, Yaari concluded.