dissolution of Parliament
Historic coalition on the verge of collapse: Israel’s government wants to initiate new elections
Naftali Bennett, Prime Minister of Israel (right) and Foreign Minister Jair Lapid
© Gil Cohen-Magen/ / Picture Alliance
In Israel, the historic eight-party coalition has collapsed. Prime Minister Naftali Bennett has announced that parliament is to be dissolved and the way paved for new elections. It would be the fifth in three and a half years.
The fifth parliamentary election in less than four years could soon be in Israel: the two heads of the governing coalition, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and Foreign Minister Jair Lapid, are aiming for a dissolution of parliament and the initiation of new elections after just one year. The two politicians announced on Monday that a corresponding draft law would be introduced in the Knesset next week. All “attempts to stabilize the coalition” have been “exhausted”.
“We have done everything to preserve the coalition,” Bennett said in front of the Israeli parliament. Lapid praised the prime minister for putting “national interests ahead of his own.”
Israel: New elections according to media reports in October
In June 2021, Bennett and Lapid agreed on a historic coalition government whose eight parties come from all political camps. Above all, they shared the desire to replace long-term Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who had previously been in power for twelve years. For the first time in Israel’s history, the governing alliance also included an Arab party, the Raam Party.
The right-wing hardliner Naftali Bennett and his ally Lapid from the liberal Yesh Atid party then decided on a rotation principle, according to which the two wanted to take turns at the head of government. Accordingly, Lapid is to become head of the interim government if the bill dissolving parliament is passed. Lapid will take over as prime minister “soon,” Bennett said on Monday evening. According to a report in the Haaretz newspaper, the election could then take place on October 25.
The eight-party coalition was intended to lead Israel out of an unprecedented era of political stalemate. However, the alliance was fragile from the start. In April, the coalition lost its majority in parliament with the resignation of an MP from Bennett’s nationalist Jamina party. Recently, tensions also arose during a routine vote. Some Arab MPs voted against extending a law giving settlers in the occupied West Bank the same rights as citizens in the rest of Israeli territory. Justice Minister Gideon Saar in particular sharply criticized this at the time.
“Historical government” with Arab party in coalition of eight
“As I warned, the lack of accountability on the part of certain Knesset members has led to this inevitable result,” Saar said on Monday, referring to the Arab MPs. For the next election, however, Saar gave a clear goal: “Netanyahu must be prevented from returning to the office of prime minister and subjecting the state to his personal interests,” he said on Twitter.
The opposition, led by Netanyahu, has already threatened to introduce its own bill to dissolve parliament. Apparently Bennett and Lapid wanted to forestall that.
Their decision makes it clear that “Israel’s worst political crisis did not end with the swearing in of the government,” but was only temporarily weakened, said Yohanan Plesner of the Israel Democracy Institute. Nevertheless, Plesner drew a positive conclusion: “Even if this government was one of Israel’s shortest-serving ones, it played a historic role, since it integrated an Arab party into the coalition (…) and thus paved the way for a stronger involvement of the Arab minority in the political process.”