Israel govt collapses, triggers new elections

Israel’s government collapsed Tuesday, pushing the country into yet another early election — the fourth in two years.

The Israeli Parliament dissolved itself at midnight Tuesday. The move forced a new election after weeks of infighting and paralysis in the so-called unity government, an uneasy coalition sworn in just seven months ago that paired Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s conservative Likud party with his main rival-turned-partner, Benny Gantz of the centrist Blue and White party.

Netanyahu and Gantz blamed each other for the crisis.

“I think at the current time, we should have united forces to find a way to avert these needless elections,” Netanyahu said in Parliament early Tuesday as he tried, and failed, to seek a delay in its dissolution.

A new election must take place in three months and is scheduled for March 23. But an election date in the late spring or summer, once the coronavirus vaccination campaign is well underway, might have been more advantageous for Netanyahu.

Parliament automatically dispersed at midnight after failing to meet the legal deadline for approving a budget for 2020. Netanyahu, whose party holds the finance portfolio, had refused to present a budget, in violation of his coalition agreement with Gantz — the ostensible reason for the government breakdown.

But at the heart of the crisis lies a deep, mutual distrust between the two men and a country fundamentally split over the fate of Netanyahu, whose corruption trial is scheduled to move into an intensive, evidentiary stage in early 2021, requiring his regular presence in court. He has been charged with bribery, fraud and breach of trust. He denies any wrongdoing.

Analysts said that Netanyahu was gambling on another election in the hope of forming a right-wing, religious government that would grant him some kind of immunity from prosecution.

“It’s not the budget, stupid,” said Reuven Hazan, a professor of political science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Netanyahu “needs a government that will pass legislation either to delay his case for the foreseeable future or cancel it altogether,” he added.

But failing to present a budget and forcing the dispersal of Parliament provides him with an escape hatch from the coalition agreement stipulating that Gantz take over as prime minister 11 months from now. From the inception of the unity government, few people, including Gantz, expected Netanyahu to honor that agreement.

Gantz’s party, for its part, refused to back any compromise with Netanyahu over the authority for making key appointments, including for the posts of attorney general and state attorney. A compromise would have violated Blue and White’s flagship policy of upholding the rule of law but would have kept the government on life support.