Why 70 Percent of Israelis Want Netanyahu to Resign

5 comments

1. Yair Rosenberg: “Israelis want Benjamin Netanyahu to say sorry and go away. A survey released this week by the Israel Democracy Institute found that a staggering 87 percent of Israelis think the prime minister should take responsibility for the events of October 7, and 73 percent want him to resign either now or after the Gaza war. These figures might seem shocking to outsiders, but they are actually old news. Since October 7, the Israeli public has consistently told pollsters that it wants Netanyahu gone—a preference that has held through every twist and turn of the war and has, if anything, intensified over time.

   “The reason for this is simple: Netanyahu not only presided over the worst security failure in Israel’s history but has actively governed against the will of the country’s majority. He and his allies received just 48.4 percent of the vote in late 2022. Still, the Israeli leader did not seek to unite a polarized population by pivoting to the center. Instead he cobbled together a sectarian coalition with unpopular extremist constituencies: far-right messianic settlers and the ultra-Orthodox. Because the votes of both of these groups are necessary for the government to remain in power, they have been able to extort Netanyahu for ever-expanding giveaways and political gains. The result: On core issue after issue, Netanyahu has been the prime minister for the 30 percent.

   “Take the cease-fire deal that is currently in limbo in Gaza. Polls consistently show that some 70 percent of Israelis want the arrangement to continue until all of the hostages are free, even if that means releasing many convicted terrorists and ending the war with Hamas still at large. Likewise, a significant majority of Israelis reject any effort to resettle Gaza. But in his coalition, Netanyahu is beholden to the radical minority that wants not only to restart the war but also to ethnically cleanse Gaza in order to repopulate it with Jewish communities. And so the hostage deal teeters on the edge …”

   “Netanyahu’s disregard for majority opinion predates October 7 and may be his government’s original sin. In January 2023, his coalition announced its first major policy initiative: a sweeping overhaul of Israel’s judicial system that would dramatically disempower the country’s supreme court. This extraordinary reordering of Israeli democracy was not conceived through public debate and brokered consensus, but rather produced by a conservative think tank and rammed through the Parliament on a narrow party-line vote. Polls found that the plan was opposed by—say it with me—some two-thirds of the Israeli public. For a time, mass demonstrations against it paralyzed the country, in the largest sustained protest movement in Israeli history. Only the cataclysmic events of October 7 shelved the overhaul—and now Netanyahu’s coalition is bringing it back …”

   “These are not cherry-picked, incidental issues. They are the fundamental fault lines in Israeli politics, because they will determine the country’s future. And on every single one, Netanyahu and his government are on the opposite side of the overwhelming majority of the Israeli public. Technically, that’s all within the rules of the game. The prime minister’s coalition may not have gotten a majority of the vote, but thanks to a quirk of the Israeli electoral system, it did get the majority of seats in Parliament, and unless it collapses, it can govern as it wishes until the next election, in 2026. But morally and practically, Netanyahu’s blatant disregard for the preferences of the public is a disaster for Israeli democracy, because it undermines faith in the system’s ability to deliver for its people.”

   Read more here: [https://theatln.tc/6NyrPFKh](https://theatln.tc/6NyrPFKh) 

2. It should be noted that Netanyahu’s party the Likud gets on average between 20-30% of the vote, so it could be that his own voters are the only hold outs.

   Though more likely internal Likud factions want him to resign and percentages of other parties want him to stay.

3. “It’s just Netanyahu” this was spammed throughout last year, when is the Israeli society as whole admit what is the real issue?

   Netanyahu is being used as a convenient target to distract from the deeper systemic issue, even if he’s removed or arrested, it wouldn’t change how Israel treats Palestinians because the problem goes beyond just one leader, a significant portion of Israeli society sees Palestinians as inferior, which is why the policies and actions against them continue regardless of who is in power, and why the conflict keeps going and everyone is miserable.

   Blaming Netanyahu alone might make people feel like they’re addressing the problem, but in reality, it could just be a way to avoid confronting the larger issue of systemic oppression.

4. One of, if not the greatest, failure of military intelligence in Israeli history and he was captain of the ship at the time.

5. Just cut a hole at the big toe.
   Boom! Big ToE solved.

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