Now that Israel is less than three months away from elections, things are beginning to heat up. Are Israelis thinking about and voting on the same issues that people abroad believe they are, or think they should be? If people here are “one issue” voters, what’s the issue? And given that it’s the blocs that matter and not the parties, how is one to choose?
Glimpses into Israel’s campaigns from the inside …
David Horovitz and the Times of Israel called it weeks ago, in what now seems like an almost prophetic headline … now that elections are upon us and the polls are showing that Netanyahu (for the moment, at least) has but bleak prospects of forming a coalition, he is likely to get more desperate and things are like to get ever uglier as we grow closer to October 27.
Israelis got a taste of the new lows that are likely soon to follow (other parties might do the same, and we’ll point to those, too) with the video above, which much of the Israeli press referred to as an “own goal” — meaning that it was so gross that Israelis far beyond Eisenkot’s supporters voiced their disgust.
Even some Likud voters were shaking their heads in disbelief.
Netanyahu, of course, said he’d known nothing about the video prior to its being posted (of course) and the Likud promptly issued a revised version.
What was wrong with the video? It ends with the following two screens:
ON THE LEFT: [Gadi] Eisenkot has no chance of forging a government
ON THE RIGHT: without Yair Golan and the Arab parties.
OK, fair enough, right? Yair Golan, who runs what is left of the old Labor Party (Ben Gurion’s party, mostly of blessed memory), has stepped in it a few times, and we’ll see the references to that below. And having Arab parties be in the coalition? That’s controversial for many Israelis, not because they’re racists, but because many of the people on the Arab party lists are explicitly opposed to Israel’s being a Jewish state. Mansour Abbas, the head of the main Arab party who appears in this video (when Eisenkot runs to hug him) has explicitly stated that Israel is a Jewish state and will always be one, but many of those below him on the list are very different.
So what’s wrong with the video?
The video, clearly, is an AI creation. That’s obvious. As Eisenkot runs (seemingly) to embrace a young man wearing a T-shirt that says אחדות ישראל, “Israel’s Unity,” Eisenkot actually ignores him and goes on to embrace Abbas.
So what? Well, the young man in the video (again, an AI creation) looks a LOT like Eisenkot’s son who was killed in the war; 25-year-old Master Sergeant Gal Eisenkot was killed in Gaza in December 2023. The suggestion that Eisenkot would “ignore” his own son and his son’s values to embrace Abbas was so gross that the video evoked expressions of disgust almost across the political spectrum.
The video has been taken down, replaced with a new version a young woman (instead of the young man) who bears no resemblance to anyone.
This was likely merely “coming attractions” for what we’re bound to see ahead …
What, then, is the problem with Yair Golan, or with Eisenkot forming a government with him?
Golan is, by all accounts, a genuine hero. He has a long and stellar military CV and rose very far up the ranks of the IDF. On October 7, even though he was already in his sixties, when he woke up to the news of the attack, he grabbed his gun and helmet and raced from his home to the Nova site, where he rescued numerous people and participated in several battles. He was widely praised — across the spectrum — for his heroism on that day.
So why does he figure so prominently in the video? Because despite his impressive record, he has said some fairly stupid things since then in his rose as the head of the Democrats party. One of the main moments is the one referred to in the ad at the bottom of the front page of Makor Rishon this past Friday.
The key to the anti-Golan/Eisenkot ad is the wording in WHITE in the middle, which says, “A sane country does not kill babies as a hobby.” Golan said that in opposition to some of Israel’s policies in Gaza during the war, but it was obviously way, way too far to go. Israel killing babies as a “hobby”? That’s what Europeans say. Israelis were disgusted with him, too, and like the Likud with the video, he’s tried to walk it back.
But it was record-breaking stupid, and it’s sticking.
Hence the wording in the YELLOW on the left: “Eisenkot [who will clearly need Golan’s seats to form a coalition] will create a government that is dangerous for Israel.” And in the middle in the box, “It’s dangerous!”
Will it do damage? It won’t sway Democrat voters to abandon him.
But that’s not the issue. This entire election hinges on the question of how many right-leaning voters, who are disgusted with Bibi for one reason or another, can be pried away to vote for the center? With Eisenkot himself, few have a major problem. So the way to get them not to abandon Bibi is to focus the campaign not on Eisenkot, but on those with whom he’d almost certainly have to form a coalition.
Hence the focus on Golan.
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Who’s the youthful looking kid in the photo with the Galil rifle? Without looking below, can you identify him?
It’s Naftali Bennett.
Early in the campaign, Naftali Bennett, the former PM, was the front-runner to take on Netanyahu. But as he’s been losing ground to Eisenkot, who now leads among opposition parties, Bennett is wisely doing everything he can to restore the sheen to his image and his campaign.
The following just appeared on his Facebook feed:
Over the photo above, he wrote the following:
Exactly 36 years ago today I enlisted in Sayeret Matkal [DG - Israel’s most elite commando unit]. And it started badly. (A few personal words from me to the August ‘26 draftees):
**
The first weeks of basic training were very hard for me. I was the exception. Most of the guys around me had a father or brother or friend who was a Sayeret graduate, or at least an infantryman, but I didn’t know anyone like that. I came from a different world, the son of two new immigrant parents who barely knew anyone in the country. A bit of an outsider. I felt like everyone else in the platoon understood more, was more prepared than me, and I constantly had to ask in order to understand what needed to be done and when. I got a lot of punishments and extra guard duty because of mistakes. Back then they called it “shell shock from basic training.” Today they simply call it “burnout.”
The beginning was hard for me, but what followed was better. I pushed myself and completed the Sayeret Matkal course, and I went on to serve as a squad commander and platoon commander of fighters in the Maglan unit. Those years made me who I am today.
I’m telling you this, dear draftees, because it’s clear to me that some of you will also have a hard start. And it matters to me that you know: that’s okay. That even a bad beginning can have an excellent ending. And one day the hard period will end, and you’ll look back and be very proud of yourselves.
I love you all very, very much, and I pray that God watches over all of you.
Naftali Bennett August ‘90, Giora Team
It’s all there. Reference to his stellar military record. The fact that he made it on his own, as the son of immigrant parents and as a young guy who hadn’t grown up here. And of course, wishing the new draftees well on the day of the the traditional massive August draft is a reminder that not everyone who should be is getting drafted this month.
Who’s not? Well, the Haredim, obviously. And why not? Bennett’s post is how you mention Bibi without mentioning Bibi.
It’s all just beginning to get interesting, and the coming weeks and months are likely to be action-packed on the. political front. We’ll share more about all this in the days to come.
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