Eye on the Middle East | Israel's mass protests and Netanyahu's far-right gambit
Even as Netanyahu moved into the politics of self-preservation (of power), it is now well known that the October 7 attacks dented his image as ‘Mr Security’
In the summer of 1995, as Yitzhak Rabin pushed forward with the Oslo Accords based on territorial compromise, Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu, spearheaded protests against the Oslo process and Rabin himself. While Rabin’s assassination that year almost derailed Bibi’s political career given his proactive participation in demonstrations that called for Rabin’s death, it was a string of Hamas bombings in Jerusalem in 1996 that put Netanyahu’s star again on the ascent. Fiercely against ceding land to any potential Palestinian state, the Bibi brand of politics was populist from its provenance, intensifying further as Oslo proceeded, and ultimately yielding the biggest dividend to Netanyahu – the post of Prime Minister in 1996.
On September 3, 2024, about half a million Israelis took to the streets, chanting against Netanyahu, bringing the state to a halt. Led by Israel’s largest trade unions such as Histadrut, the protests were triggered by Hamas’ murder of six hostages and directed against Netanyahu for his failure to “bring them home”, even as the death toll in Gaza continued to rise. A year earlier, in July, Israel saw the then-largest street demonstrations in its history, against Netanyahu’s attempts to constitutionally subvert the judiciary after being indicted for corruption. However, while global protests against Israel’s killings of Palestinian civilians in Gaza continue, the ongoing protests within Israel are different in character. At once, they represent Netanyahu’s enduring legacy and the cost incurred as the longest-serving premier.
The Netanyahu doctrine
Netanyahu’s early years as Prime Minister revealed the fundamentals of his politics that he would exacerbate in the decades to come. Politically, he famously wavered on the two-state solution, paying lip service to American demands under successive Presidents from Clinton to Obama while domestically working against a Palestinian state, sanctioning more settlements over the years. Economically, Netanyahu undid Ben-Gurion’s over-reliance on foreign capital and pursued economic autonomy. The failure of Oslo along with the second Intifada allowed Netanyahu to focus on his Thatcherite neo-liberal reforms and private-sector growth without the need to placate Washington with participation in a peace process.
For perspective on the endurance of this approach, Israel’s foreign exchange reserves reached an all-time high in June 2024. Supporting these broader planks, was Bibi’s focus on security; specifically on Hamas and its rocket attacks from Gaza. This allowed Netanyahu to oversee key measures including the Iron Dome, a 40-mile ‘smart fence’, among others. As he earned the moniker, ‘Mr Security’, Hamas in turn also became a vital necessity for Netanyahu as the immediate, proximate, and enduring object of Israeli insecurity. To that end, Bibi reportedly encouraged indirect Qatari funding to the group, even as rocket-airstrike exchanges between Israel and Hamas became routine, incrementally increasing in scale. Collectively, these produced the ‘Netanyahu Doctrine’ that has made security its centre-piece combined with a steady consolidation of Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory.
Even as massive protests for social justice – triggered by rising inequality – rocked his government in 2011, Netanyahu’s politics since the 2013 elections has only driven him farther to the right, injecting discomfort even into the usually centre-right leaders of the Likud party. For instance, in 2015, Netanyahu fought tooth and nail to prevent Likud voters from being drawn to far-right parties such as the Habayit Hayehudi. His strategy, however, had not been to contest their politics but to compete and co-opt – he doubled down on his commitment to preventing a Palestinian state, making more explicit statements in television interviews than before. Today, Hayehudi’s larger iteration (following a merger) is a crucial ally in Netanyahu’s government – the Miflaga Datit Leumit with the hard-line pro-settlement Bezalel Smotrich serving as finance minister. An earlier column showed how Smotrich now has greater powers over the West Bank’s administration.
This has largely been the result of the judiciary cornering Netanyahu, coupled with the effects of a shaky Naftali Bennett-Yair Lapid coalition unseating him after the 2021 polls. While the coalition fell, it forced Netanyahu to seek even more solace in the farther right in his 2022 electoral fight. Eventually, Bibi would bring to power, what the Jerusalem Post called, the most right-wing government in Israeli history, even elbowing out erstwhile allies from the centre-right such as Benny Gantz’s National Unity and Gideon Sa’ar’s New Hope (a break-away of Likud) as the war in Gaza progressed.
What do the current protests mean for Bibi?
Even as Netanyahu moved into the politics of self-preservation (of power), it is now well known that the October 7 terror attacks palpably dented his image as ‘Mr Security’. Few physical manifestations of this unravelling match the ‘smart fence’ preventing Hamas’ mass infiltration. However, a key effect of the attack was to lock Bibi firmly into the far-right’s embrace, removing all choice. Netanyahu would either give in and lose power, or swing even farther right and stay as premier. Having observed as far back as in 1992 that Likud’s internal disunity had handed Yitzak Rabin a technical electoral victory, Netanyahu has since prioritised the need for a united front – leading to him staunchly standing by his far-right allies today even as they grow comfortable calling for the commission of war crimes in public.
While being against the war in Gaza in effect – due to Netanyahu’s failures to bring the hostages back – the protests are not anti-occupation. In fact, they overwhelmingly focus on the hostages and Hamas’ murders, rather than on the fundamentals of Israel’s occupation or Gaza’s rising death toll. Indeed, repeated polls in Israel show approval for Israeli control of Gaza, removing Hamas. Hence, rather than triggering an urgency to reach a deal, both the protests as well as his far-right crutch, push Netanyahu to further entrench his older kinetic approach. Consequently, the immediate failings of this approach matter little to Netanyahu – even as families of hostages approach Washington to bypass Israel and strike a deal with Hamas.
This allows Netanyahu to push back more privately and publicly against anything perceived as a concession. As recently as September 5, while President Biden stated that a ceasefire was close, Netanyahu publicly asserted that this was “exactly inaccurate…there’s not a deal in the making.” With a history of opposing exchange deals with Hamas even when he had more political room (such as in 2011) as well as publicly rebuking US Presidents (with the exception of Trump), Bibi’s response to the protests today is comfortable and characteristic. He seeks “forgiveness” from hostages’ families but insists that it is Hamas that “has to make the concessions.”
Many have written off 74-year-old Netanyahu, who has been similarly declared politically dead several times before. However, while the protests reflect a growing focus on getting the hostages back, they do not concurrently yield new political fuel for the older centre-left such as Labour and Meretz. If anything, they vindicate Bibi’s broader brand of politics strategically by demolishing support for a potential peace process and the two-state solution. Indeed, the alternate leaders leading popularity polls are the likes of Benny Gantz who too has been forced to lean harder right despite being historically centre-right. It was Gantz’s support that allowed the Knesset to pass the resolution against Palestinian statehood in July. Netanyahu’s own ratings improved after he committed to retaining control of the Philadelphi Corridor at least until Israel’s security was guaranteed. Consequently, as Bibi fails to bring the hostages home, he succeeds in cementing his broader policy of Israeli assertiveness against any concessions on Palestine – even if at the potential cost of his own person.
Bashir Ali Abbas is a research associate at the Council for Strategic and Defense Research, New Delhi, and a South Asia Visiting Fellow at the Stimson Center, Washington DC. The views expressed are personal.
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