Haaretz Podcast

Nothing is helping Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s current coalition boost its standing in the polls, and it is clear that the premier is “panicking,” said Haaretz columnist Dr. Dahlia Scheindlin, speaking on the Haaretz Election Podcast.  Scheindlin joins Haaretz correspondent Judy Maltz and host Allison Kaplan Sommer to discuss the entrance of a new right-wing party led by ex-general Ofer Winter into the race, joining the plethora of “pop-up” right-wing parties that are causing Netanyahu’s alarm at the possibility that one or more will fall under the electoral threshold, and the precious votes in his camp will be wasted. "Netanyahu is begging the right wing not to fragment the parties. He's warning the right wing: If you do the wrong thing, the entire world explodes," Scheindlin said, ahead of the September 8 deadline for merging with other parties and submitting final lists. On the podcast, Maltz shares what she’s found as she visits cities and towns around Israel taking the pulse of voters. Kiryat Shmona – Israel’s most targeted city, devastated by three years of war – is still grappling with the 2023 evacuation that is proving to be somewhat permanent, Maltz says. “People are pretty angry and often talk about themselves being abandoned, unseen and forgotten.” Still, like the Likud strongholds along the Gaza border that she has visited, Maltz found many clinging to party loyalties despite their disappointment with Netanyahu and his government. Some favor non-Netanyahu right-wingers, but others remain loyal to the prime minister despite the devastating events that happened on his watch.  "Many of them subscribe to these conspiracy theories about the army in cahoots with Hamas together orchestrating October 7 to make Netanyahu look bad," Maltz explained. Read more: Ex-IDF General and Far-right Hardliner Ofer Winter Reveals New Party Ahead of Israel's Election Analysis by Dahlia Scheindlin | Two Months Out, Netanyahu's Bloc Is Stuck in Polls. But All the Rest Is a Mystery By Smashing a Palestinian Monument, an Israeli Far-right Lawmaker Brought West Bank Reality to Light Reality Check: As the Election Nears, Haaretz Debunks Israeli Politicians' Biggest Lies 'Israel on Steroids': Arad Foreshadows What Another Netanyahu Victory Might Look Like 'People Here Like Ben-Gvir's Tough-guy Approach': Will This Netanyahu Stronghold Near Gaza Go Further Right?See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The glut of new small parties throwing their hats in the ring is increasing the chances that after the voters have their say, there will not be a decisive win either for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition nor the opposition parties determined to topple him.  "All of these new little parties are headed by individuals who are placing their ego above the political outcome. They can't possibly join an existing party – they have to try to start their own," said Haaretz columnist Dahlia Scheindlin on the Haaretz Election Podcast.   As a result, the voters may not end up determining who will be prime minister, and instead a “little gang” of “six, seven or eight male party leaders” will meet and decide the make-up of the coalition, Scheindlin said.  Scheindlin joined fellow columnist Esther Solomon and host Allison Kaplan Sommer to discuss the results of the Likud primaries, opposition frontrunner Gadi Eisenkot’s declaration that there will be no Palestinian state on his watch, what appears to be a politicized decision by Israel’s internal security service not to officially protect Eisenkot, and how Netanyahu, stuck in the polls, appears to be dangerously “firing in all directions” in order to find a way to victory.  "He has the capacity to aggravate, or provoke, or exploit any number of crises that are happening in this region,” Solomon said. Little, however, Scheindlin pointed out, appears to be moving the needle for the prime minister. He has shown that "you can attack Iran and attack Iran again. You can bomb Lebanon. You can kill Hassan Nasrallah, and nothing has changed the polls." Read more: The U.S. Peace Plan Is Grave for Gaza and Great for Netanyahu Netanyahu Rival Eisenkot Vows No Palestinian State: 'Not Now, Not in Next Government' Reality Check: As the Election Nears, Haaretz Debunks Israeli Politicians' Biggest Lies The Petty Politics Destroying Israel's Opposition Likud's Casualty List: The Netanyahu Loyalists Headed Home After a Brutal PrimarySee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The battle over the Likud Party primaries this week was a clear example of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asserting his dominance over his political kingdom, Haaretz senior analyst Esther Solomon told the Haaretz Election Podcast.  Netanyahu had unsuccessfully tried to cancel the always robust Likud primaries altogether – ultimately compromising by pushing through a measure where he chose the candidates for nine key spots on the top of the list. He included a spot for Oren Dobronsky, an Israeli high-tech entrepreneur and hummus chain owner in Silicon Valley who has not lived in Israel for years, has no political experience and made headlines recently for calling U.S. President Donald Trump a “morally corrupt piece of shit” in the recent past.  The prime minister’s message was clear, Solomon said: "This is no longer about the Likud party. This is about me." Solomon joined Haaretz correspondent Judy Maltz and host Allison Kaplan Sommer to discuss the top stories from the last week week, which included controversy over efforts by expat Israelis to travel en masse to vote to replace the current government, and a proposal by opposition frontrunner Gadi Eisenkot to form a minority government even if he doesn’t have a decisive election victory.  Also on the podcast, Maltz described her encounters as she travels across Israeli cities to take their pulse ahead of the election, including Kfar Chabad, where, she quipped “only the Messiah is more popular” than far-right extremist Internal Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and the Arab city of Umm-al-Fahm, where she said it was “very sad” that many young well-educated Palestinian citizens of Israel said they were so alienated that they were not planning to vote. Read more: Netanyahu's New Election Ploy Smells of Desperation and Elon Musk In Monday's Likud Party Primary, Netanyahu Hopes to Get Rid of Lawmakers Whom He Had Nurtured in the Past Netanyahu Changes Likud Rules to Let Far-right Politician Run in Primary 'People Here Like Ben-Gvir's Tough-guy Approach': Will This Netanyahu Stronghold Near Gaza Go Further Right? 'We Need to Finish the Job': The Israeli Town Where Itamar Ben-Gvir Ranks Second Only to the MessiahSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

While the polls in Israel have been relatively stagnant, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s personal standing has faltered. “The minute that Netanyahu's stock seems weak, people will start selling it, and that has begun to happen,” said Haaretz columnist Joshua Leifer, speaking on the Haaretz Podcast. Joining Leifer on the podcast, Haaretz correspondent Linda Dayan observed that in her conversations with mainstream Israelis who “don’t identify as leftists,” they see a real alternative leader in challenger Gadi Eisenkot.  “People have said of Netanyahu in the past that there's no one who can replace him, who has the experience and the gravitas that we need. Now, for the first time in a very long time, people are saying it looks like there's someone who can actually do it.” The two panelists joined host Allison Kaplan Sommer to discuss the debut of new right-wing parties who eschew Netanyahu and their “machinations” attempting to engineer a government coalition that would include the anti-Netanyahu center-right – while excluding Yair Golan’s Democrats Party, and, of course the Arab parties.  "There is maybe a hope or a fantasy of finding some way of creating a government that excludes Yair Golan and the Democrats, and that closes the door definitively on having a potential Arab party in the coalition,” said Leifer, referring to the right’s growing fear of the prospect of an Eisenkot-led government that includes Mansour Abbas’ United Arab List. Read more:  How to Actually Read the Israeli Election Polls Israel's Opposition Parties Are Courting New Immigrants With a New Set of Priorities In Haifa, the 'Putin Aliyah' and Despairing Arab Citizens Warn of A Dire Future Analysis by Joshua Leifer | Eisenkot Keeps Running Away From What Everyone Knows He Believes Most Israelis Fear Upcoming Election Could Be Compromised, New Poll FindsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Gadi Eisenkot "hasn't finished his rise" in the polls after his party, Yashar, has overtaken Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud Party for several weeks in a row, while the potential coalition of opposition parties is soaring past that of the current government, said Haaretz columnist Dahlia Scheindlin, speaking on the Haaretz Podcast. Scheindlin, a veteran political strategist and analyst, noted that even the right-wing pollsters, who are heavily biased in favor of Netanyahu's coalition, are showing numbers that point to "a decline ever since the ceasefire and the war with Iran," reflecting perceptions among supporters who once "saw him as a great global statesperson." The podcast panel, including Haaretz correspondent Nagham Zbeedat and host Allison Kaplan Sommer, reviewed the noteworthy political events of the past week, most prominently the intriguing news that could shake up the coalition mathematics: the Arab Islamist Ra'am Party's plans to invite a former senior police officer and centrist Jewish politician to claim the number two position on its list. "Having a Jewish Israeli politician join an Arab party, especially an Islamist political party," would represent a "significant milestone," Zbeedat said, predicting that the move would boost support for Ra'am and increase the chances that an anti-Netanyahu coalition would invite the party into a coalition, which could well be its key to winning power. Zbeedat herself, however, is not lending her vote to Ra'am or any other political party. She explained on the podcast why, like many other Palestinian citizens of Israel, she chooses not to participate in elections. She does not believe, she said, in taking part in a "performance" of democracy and granting "legitimacy" to a government that "enables the daily occupation struggles" and "doesn't accept my existence." Read more:  Game Changer? What if This Jewish Lawmaker Joins an Israeli Arab Party Why I, a Palestinian Citizen, Don't Vote in Israeli Elections Arab Parties Are Talking Unity. Their Voters Have Much Bigger Issues With Confidence, Conviction and Even Talking Occupation: The Democrats Are a New Sight in Israeli Politics How Arab Party Leader Mansour Abbas Changed Israel's Political GameSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s insistence on traveling to the White House three months before the Israeli election signals his desperation to boost his sinking fortunes at the polls, Haaretz senior columnist Esther Solomon told the Haaretz Election Podcast.  Despite his unpopularity with major portions of both American political parties and his turbulent relationship with President Donald Trump regarding the ongoing conflict with Iran, the Israeli leader “does still think that a photo op with Trump is going to play well for him, even though it's not entirely clear if Trump is going to provide exactly the kind of celebratory hugs” he wishes for, Solomon said.  But in his current political situation, the Israeli leader “has to pull out every single stop, and he is doing that across the board. Whether it's in terms of military operations, every kind of political manipulation or strategy that he has, in order to pull every last possible vote for the bloc of parties that would support him to be prime minister.” Fellow Haaretz columnist Joshua Leifer added that over the past year, “when Netanyahu flies to the United States, it has been to convince President Trump to jump back into the war, and I think that that's probably what he wants to do under the pretense of going to mourn the late Senator Lindsey Graham."  On the podcast, Solomon and Leifer joined host Allison Kaplan Sommer to discuss the rising fortunes of Netanyahu’s opposition and the growing signs of concern in the ruling coalition camp, illustrated by an AI-generated video of rival Gadi Eisenkot featuring an image of his slain son, that was widely condemned as offensive.  The panelists also discussed how escalating settler violence in the West Bank is making the months until the election more volatile and dangerous. Leifer said that Israelis must “take seriously” statements by Netanyahu’s extremist right-wing partners that “this is the last chance that the settler right is going to have for a long time to stake its claim in the ground and end the possibility of a two-state solution. We should not be naïve about the lengths to which they are willing to go to prevent that possibility from happening." Read more: In D.C., Netanyahu Will Bid Farewell Both to Lindsey Graham and Unconditional U.S. Support Analysis by Joshua Leifer | Will Israel's Opposition Be Able to Undo Netanyahu's Damage? 'People Here Like Ben-Gvir's Tough-guy Approach': Will This Netanyahu Stronghold Near Gaza Go Further Right? 'Not a One-man Party': Likud Blocks Netanyahu Bid to Scrap Primaries 'The Israeli Government Has an Interest in Disrupting the Elections, Giving Free Rein to Thugs'See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Israel is in a strategically weakened position – and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will take a hard political hit if reports on the details of U.S.-Iran memorandum of understanding are accurate, Haaretz columnist Joshua Leifer said on the Haaretz Podcast.  Netanyahu had been “riding high,” planning to face Israel’s upcoming elections in the fall having compensated for his failures that led to October 7 by boldly “reconfiguring the map of the Middle East, and disassembling Iran's proxy network of Hezbollah and Hamas, and taking on the Iranian regime itself,” Leifer said.  The Israeli leader thought “his legacy [would] be rehabilitated by those wars. Fast forward to where we are now, and that's not the case, and he’s having to confront that,” Leifer added. “Strategically, Israel's in a terrible place, where the Iranian regime is stronger than it was, and it is now able to enforce a new kind of equation where Israeli freedom of movement is limited by the potential threat of ballistic missiles from Iran – which wasn't the case prior to October 7.” Netanyahu, Leifer said, has been “backed into a corner” on all of Israel’s fronts – Gaza, Lebanon, Syria and now Iran. He must follow Trump’s dictates and has turned Israel into “a total vassal state of the U.S.” and “Trump’s lapdog.” If he were to defy Trump, he runs the risk of losing American support, which could endanger the country even more. Read more:  What You Need to Know About the U.S.-Iran Deal – and What It Means for Israel Report: Billions in Frozen Iranian Assets May Be Released Under U.S.–Iran Deal Israeli Withdrawal From Lebanon Not Part of U.S.-Iran Deal, White House Official Says 'Don't Bullshit Us, Trump': Netanyahu Loyalists Rage at 'Treacherous' United States Over Iran Deal Netanyahu Says Israel to Remain in Security Buffer Zones in Lebanon, Gaza and Syria After U.S.-Iran Deal Signed Amos Harel: The Iran Fiasco Is Netanyahu's Biggest Failure Since October 7 Read more analysis from Haaretz's Joshua LeiferSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.