Netanyahu moves closer to securing big win in Israeli election - The - The Washington Post

Amir Levy AFP/Getty Images Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his wife Sara Netanyahu accept congratulations at a Likud party celebration on March 3, 2020, in Tel Aviv.

JERUSALEM — Over the past 11 months, many pundits had declared Benjamin Netanyahu politically dead, as the longest-serving leader in Israel’s history twice failed to achieve a majority in separate elections, hemorrhaging more support each time.

On Monday, the indomitable prime minister strode rejuvenated back to center stage in Israeli politics, reversing his party’s decline and positioning himself within two parliamentary seats of a record-breaking fifth term.

But the man known as Israel’s political magician will now have to pull off two final tricks to complete the comeback: finding those two seats, maybe by poaching them from opposing parties, and navigating his own upcoming corruption trial, something no sitting prime minister has ever faced.

One day after Israel’s third election in less than a year, with just over 90 percent of the vote officially tallied, Netanyahu’s Likud party held 36 parliamentary seats, erasing its previous losses and making it once again the country’s largest party. His bloc of right-wing parties commands 59 seats in the 120-seat Knesset, Israel’s parliament, placing it far closer to the majority threshold than the rival Blue and White party, which has 32 seats.

The results could change moderately as officials count a final batch of some 300,000 votes from military bases and special biohazard polling places set up for voters quarantined because of possible exposure to the coronavirus. (Senior election officials, unable to find workers willing to open the doubly-sealed ballots, were doing the count themselves in a tent outside the parliament, according to media reports.)

But Israel was well into dissecting Netanyahu’s feat, the latest in his escape-artist career of clinging to power. Polls for months had shown little change in the dynamics of the grinding stalemate that kept Israel from forming a new government for more than a year.

But in the final weeks, as Blue and White and its leader Benny Gantz worked down a list of what critics disparaged as overly staid hanger rallies around central Israel, Netanyahu worked tirelessly to electrify his base and reawaken thousands of Likud voters who had reportedly sat out the previous election.

Likud launched what political reporters described as an unprecedented voter-targeting operation. The 70-year-old prime minister appeared all across the country, beseeching supporters to personally lobby their fellow Likudniks and encouraging them to upload video of him to social media.

By the end, in a country exhausted by the nonstop politicking of three straight elections, Netanyahu appeared to dig deeper.

As a candidate, Netanyahu “has phenomenal power,” Topaz Luk, Netanyahu’s head media adviser and strategist said in an interview the morning after the election. “Netanyahu went out to the field this time and did so many rallies.”

Menahem Kahana

AFP/Getty Images

Benny Gantz, leader of the Blue and White party, greets supporters at his campaign headquarters in Tel Aviv early on March 3, 2020, after polls officially closed.

Gantz, a former Army chief of staff, based his campaign almost entirely on being a measured, ethical alternative to the controversial, divisive and criminally indicted prime minister. Although a majority votes cast Monday were not in support of Netanyahu, Gantz’s message and manner could not prevent his rival from shouldering past him.

“The generals are not good at politics, and Bibi is the expert,” said Jonathan Rynhold, a professor of political studies at Bar-Ilan University near Tel Aviv.

Yet, while Netanyahu has seized the momentum, he still has to find two seats to create a new government. That has proved impossible for any candidate over the last two elections, but observers said Likud was now in the best position yet to pull it off. Politicians are desperate not to be blamed for pushing Israel to a fourth election.

“There will have to be maneuvering to reach that 61 seats, and the power that will come with being the 61st member of the coalition will be tremendously significant,” said Jason Pearlman, a communications strategist.

Already Tuesday, there were signs that some previously unthinkable deals were being weighed, most notably a merger of convenience between Likud and Blue and White. The two sides failed to reach a power-sharing agreement after previous elections, and Gantz has vowed never to partner with Likud as long as Netanyahu remains in charge.

But Netanyahu seemed to be leaving that door open in an election night speech that spared Gantz any criticism. And Blue and White may be calculating that Netanyahu’s trial on bribery, fraud and breach of trust, scheduled to begin in two weeks, might put him out of commission in any case.

The process of coalition building will begin formally when the vote is certified in a few days.

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2020-03-03 12:26:00Z
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