Netanyahu’s Collapsing Support

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IDEAS
BY DAHLIA SCHEINDLIN
JANUARY 24, 2024 5:00 AM EST
Scheindlin is a political analyst in Tel Aviv, a columnist at Haaretz, and the
author of The Crooked Timber of Democracy in Israel, published in September.
I sraeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu looked angry. He railed in a Jan.
18 press conference against Israel’s enemies, the media, and critics of his
leadership of the war against Hamas. He was particularly defiant about reports
that the international community, including Western and Arab countries, is
advancing a comprehensive plan to end the war based on a long-term horizon for
a Palestinian state and political resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The conflict is “not about the absence of a state, a Palestinian state,” he
practically snarled, “but rather about the existence of a state, a Jewish state.”
Netanyahu sounded almost desperate. No matter what has happened on the
ground since Hamas’ blood-drenched attack of October 7, the Israeli public has
so far shown no indication of forgiving him.

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Most countries tend to rally behind their leadership during wartime. But from
the first Israeli polls in October to the present, attitudes towards Netanyahu have
been abysmal.
Before October 7, Israelis were angry with the ultra-nationalist, right-wing
government (elected not even one year earlier), for its plans to crush the
independence of the Israeli judiciary. With colossal weekly demonstrations all
year, strikes and massive public disruptions, poll after poll showed that the
government had lost its parliamentary majority. By September, Netanyahu’s
coalition was regularly getting just 52-54 seats in surveys, compared to 64 in the
elections of late 2022 (out of 120 in Israel’s parliament).
After the Hamas attack, the bottom fell out. Most polls show the coalition scoring
in the mid-40 seat range, including the regular tracking survey for Maariv
newspaper published Jan. 19 , conducted by the pollster Menachem Lazar. In that
survey, the original coalition got 44 seats and Likud, Netanyahu’s party just 16,
half of the 32 it won in the last election. It’s the second week in a row that Likud
has scored so low, but all surveys show the party with just 17-20 seats.
Read More: My Call to Action for the Israeli Hostages
But people aren’t punishing just the coalition or just Likud. Israelis are furious at
Netanyahu personally. When asked which leader is more suitable to be prime
minister, the long unrivalled polling king has slid to a distant second place. In
mid-November, 41 percent chose Benny Gantz in a Maariv poll, a former military
Chief of Staff who became an emergency partner in the war cabinet. The 25
percent for Netanyahu was his lowest rating to date. Recently Netanyahu has
recovered slightly, to 31 percent– but 50 percent now view Gantz as more
suitable to lead. In all polls, such as Israel’s Channel 13 in December or any
others who ask the question, over 70 percent of Israelis want Netanyahu to
resign – between one-quarter and 30 percent want him to go right now, even
during the war.
Why? The Israeli public has reached the same conclusion as almost every
political observer about the prime minister. From late October through to mid-
January, weekly surveys among repeat respondents by the Agam Institute at
Jerusalem’s Hebrew University show that a majority, about 56 percent of Jewish
Israelis, think Netanyahu is bringing his personal political consideration into his
conduct of the war. (If Arab citizens of Israel had been asked, the average would
be higher.)
And in a striking finding, the Agam Institute found that the portion of people who
hold Netanyahu solely responsible for the disaster of October 7th actually
doubled, from 17 to 35 percent among Jewish Israelis. Combined with those who
hold him largely responsible, nearly three-quarters see him as the culprit for
Israel’s failures that day.
If the surveys prove out, Israel’s longest serving prime minister will exit office on
his own petard. Historically, when Netanyahu feels under the gun, he seizes on
the same themes Israel is under existential threat; Israel will be annihilated if
opponents have their way (whether political competitors in elections, or the U. S.
President seeking a two-state solution); and his favorite theme; that he alone can
prevent the certain destruction

The Manichean threat has kept in power for the better part of 15 consecutive
years. Politically eulogized more times than commentators can count (including
here, by me), the man always pulls a political Houdini-escape act to get re-elected
despite criminal indictments for corruption and any number of lesser scandals.
But the threat he warned that only he could prevent was realized, and on his
watch. “This time,” say those who predict his downfall, “there’s October 7.”
There’s also the aftermath. A traumatized public felt abandoned by a government
unprepared for the emergency. In recent weeks, anti-government
demonstrations have even returned to Tel Aviv, a growing sideshow to the larger
protests demanding that the government do more to get Israel’s hostages
released. Even Netanyahu’s emergency war cabinet minister, Gadi Eisenkot, a
former chief of staff (and newly-bereaved father to a fallen soldier), criticized
Netanyahu’s promises to release hostages through ongoing fighting as an
illusion. Netanyahu seems to be losing the last remnants of his credibility.
And yet, elections are nowhere in sight. If they turn out to be a year or more
away, today’s polls will be out of date. By then, October 7 may seem to Israelis
less of a threat than the words “Palestinian state,” a phrase that, to some Israelis,
carries the threat of another October 7, but worse. After his belligerent words,
Netanyahu may have told Biden that he’s not foreclosing the idea of a Palestinian
state entirely. But to Israelis, he will insist that preventing one is a matter of
survival.
For the many Israelis who feel this way, “existential threat” is not just
Netanyahu’s campaign posture; it’s simply how they view reality. If no one in
Israel makes the opposite case – that the lack of Palestinian freedom, the boot of
Israeli occupation on their neck for decades nurtures ongoing cycles of violence
forever, Netanyahu might be more convincing than his opponents would like to
believe.