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Netanyahu’s Reckoning?
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends a cabinet meeting at the Bible Lands Museum in Jerusalem on June 5, 2024. Photo: Gil Cohen-Magen/Pool via REUTERS
JNS.org – As the war in Gaza appears to be winding down and another appears to be winding up on Israel’s northern border, Israeli politics is returning to something like its usual state: angry contention.
For many months, the political divisions that threatened to rip the country to pieces in the year before the Oct. 7 massacre were buried by war. The interregnum appears to be over. The street protests against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government have heated up again, with the issue of a hostage deal added to the usual grievances. Netanyahu’s rival, Benny Gantz, recently quit the War Cabinet and with it the government in a very public spat with the prime minister. A recent Kan News poll showed Netanyahu would lose his Knesset majority by a considerable margin in the next election.
There is, in the end, only one reason for this discord: Netanyahu himself. Those who hate the prime minister—and they are legion—are determined to topple him once again whether through elections or other means.
However, those who have already written Netanyahu’s political obituary should proceed with caution. He is beyond question the most talented and successful Israeli politician of his generation. He commands a fiercely loyal base that will never abandon him. If Israelis emerge from this war feeling like they won something like a victory, it is entirely possible that Netanyahu will survive.
Still, this raises the question of whether Netanyahu should survive. In the interests of full disclosure, I will reveal my bias: I think Netanyahu should have resigned on Oct. 8 for the sake of personal honor, if for no other reason. Certainly, in many other countries with parliamentary systems, Netanyahu and his government could never have survived such a colossal military and intelligence failure.
For example, in 1940, when Neville Chamberlain’s appeasement policies proved a disaster, his Conservative Party removed him and replaced him with Winston Churchill. There was never a chance that this would happen in Israel, as Netanyahu’s Likud Party has always been fiercely loyal to its leaders. Nonetheless, the issue of personal honor remains.
To resign for such reasons, however, would have demanded something Netanyahu often fiercely resists: Taking responsibility for his failures.
Regarding Oct. 7, Netanyahu is almost alone in his failure to do so. Most other Israeli leaders, including those like Naftali Bennett and others who were not in power when the attack occurred, have already taken their fair share of responsibility. Netanyahu has not.
It is fairly easy to envision Netanyahu’s line of defense, especially in the next elections. He will almost certainly say something like: The Israel Defense Forces and the security establishment boxed me into their failed strategy. The United States wouldn’t let me deal properly with Hamas. Primary responsibility for the disaster rests with the previous Bennett-Lapid government. I am being scapegoated by a biased media and the Biden administration wants to force me out. It’s not my fault.
I think this refusal is sincere. I admit that this is speculation, but I am convinced that Netanyahu genuinely believes that he bears little or no responsibility for the failures of Oct. 7. This is not so much a result of arrogance or narcissism. It is because of how Netanyahu views his opponents.
Much like Richard Nixon, Netanyahu is a brilliant man often undone by the fact that he defines himself entirely by his enemies. Certainly, he has his fair share, and the hatred he arouses in his opponents is often disproportionate and unfair. Nonetheless, Netanyahu’s fervent belief that he is an infinitely aggrieved and persecuted party goes beyond reality. There is an air of paranoia to his worldview.
This is, in some ways, tragic. Because if anything may ultimately undo Netanyahu, I think it will be his failure to take responsibility. Blaming everybody else and stoking up his base’s outrage may save him, but it will be a hollow and cheap victory. It will be, in many ways, very small.
One can defend Netanyahu’s actions, of course. One could say it would have been foolish for a prime minister to resign during Israel’s most serious war in decades. Netanyahu has proven to be a relatively effective war leader. He has stood up to American pressure when it mattered. He remains one of the most skilled political tacticians in the world, and a skilled tactician is what Israel needs right now.
Yet all of this elides the simple truth that if the ship sinks while the captain is asleep in his bunk, it’s still the captain’s fault. The buck has to stop somewhere. In Israel, like it or not, it stops with the prime minister. Netanyahu’s refusal to accept the buck results in a very strange paradox: If Netanyahu is responsible for nothing, then he is simultaneously saying that he is both a strong leader and a helpless figurehead at the mercy of forces that will not allow him even to save the country from disaster.
This may prove to be an effective defense but it is a risky one. It may prompt people to ask: “Since you can’t actually do anything as prime minister, what’s the point in having you as prime minister?”
Should they ask this question, it’s not clear where Israelis may turn. Another Likud figure could replace him as leader and thus as prime minister, but Netanyahu has proven very effective at neutralizing any potential rivals. Gantz currently appears to be leading Netanyahu in most polls. A former prime minister like Bennett could return to power. Israelis may seek out a leader even more right-wing than Netanyahu. Moreover, given that Bennett served as prime minister despite winning less than 10% of the vote, it is theoretically possible that anyone could replace Netanyahu.
One wonders, of course, if any replacement is preferable. For example, would Bennett or Gantz be willing to stand up to Washington when necessary? Would they be willing to defy the world’s opprobrium? Would they be willing to go the distance?
The answer may be “no” to all three. If so, Israel may be well served by retaining Netanyahu for the moment. Nonetheless, it is more or less certain that one thing Netanyahu is not willing to do is take responsibility. Whatever one thinks of him, this is a very serious character flaw, and a leader’s character does matter.
Character, moreover, is fate. Love him or hate him, Netanyahu is something very close to a great man, if only because of his extraordinary longevity. But if, out of his deep sense of grievance, he cannot bring himself to admit to his own failures, he will in some ways undo everything he hoped would be his legacy. This would be a profoundly tragic ending. Nonetheless, it is the ending that any leader who cannot acknowledge the reality of his own power deserves.
The post Netanyahu’s Reckoning? first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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As Gaza War Continues, Hamas Calls for Global Protests While Israel Marks Breakthroughs in Medical Innovation
A pro-Hamas march in London, United Kingdom, Feb. 17, 2024. Photo: Chrissa Giannakoudi via Reuters Connect
As the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas calls for global protests amid stalled Gaza ceasefire talks, Israel has broken new ground despite the ongoing conflict, achieving a major medical breakthrough in synthetic human kidney development.
The contrast illustrates a stark contrast between the priorities of Hamas, an international designated terrorist group that has ruled Gaza for nearly two decades, and Israel, the lone democracy in the Middle East that has long been a leader in tech and medical innovation.
On Wednesday, Hamas urged worldwide protests in support of Palestinians, calling on the international community “to denounce Israel’s genocidal war and starvation policy in Gaza.”
“We call for continuing and escalating the popular pressure in all cities and squares on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday … through rallies, demonstrations and sit-ins outside the embassies of the Israeli regime and its allies, particularly in the US,” the statement read.
The Palestinian terrorist group also called to expose what it described as “the terrorism of the Zio-Nazi occupation against defenseless civilians.”
Hamas’s latest move against Israel comes amid stalled indirect negotiations over a proposed 60-day ceasefire and hostage release deal, which collapsed last month after the group vowed it would not disarm unless an independent Palestinian state is established — rejecting a key Israeli demand to end the war in Gaza.
In its statement, Hamas demanded the opening of all border crossings to allow immediate aid into the war-torn enclave and urged a global condemnation of “the international community’s inaction on the Israeli crimes.”
Amid mounting international pressure to address the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, Israel announced new measures to facilitate the delivery of aid, including temporary pauses in fighting in certain areas and the creation of protected routes for aid convoys.
Israeli officials have previously accused Hamas of diverting aid for terrorist activities and selling supplies at inflated prices to civilians, while also blaming the United Nations and other foreign organizations for enabling this diversion.
Hamas’s statement also emphasized that the “global resistance movement must continue until Israeli aggression on Gaza ends and the siege on the coastal strip is lifted.”
Meanwhile, as Israel faces escalating hostilities and the heavy toll of war, the Jewish state continues to push the boundaries of innovation and resilience, achieving new medical breakthroughs while confronting ongoing challenges.
In a major medical breakthrough, scientists at Sheba Medical Center and Tel Aviv University have successfully grown a synthetic 3D miniature human kidney in a lab using specialized stem cells derived from kidney tissue — one of the most promising advances in regenerative medicine.
Dr. Dror Harats, chairman of Sheba’s Research Authority, described this achievement as a reflection of Israel’s leading role in global medical innovation.
“Despite growing efforts to isolate Israel from international science, breakthroughs like this prove our impact is both lasting and essential,” he said.
In a landmark study, a team from Sheba’s Safra Children’s Hospital and Tel Aviv University’s Sagol Center for Regenerative Medicine created synthetic kidney organs that matured and remained stable for 34 weeks — the longest-lasting and most refined kidney organoids developed to date.
Nearly a decade ago, the research team became the first to successfully isolate human kidney tissue stem cells — the cells responsible for the organ’s development and growth.
Previous attempts to grow kidneys in a lab using general-purpose stem cells were short-lived, typically lasting only a few weeks and often producing unwanted cell types that compromised research accuracy.
However, this Israeli research team used stem cells taken directly from kidney tissue — cells that naturally develop into kidney parts — allowing them to create a much purer and more stable model with key features found in real kidneys.
This medical breakthrough could have far-reaching implications, redefining the current understanding of kidney diseases and advancing the development of innovative treatments.
Researchers believe the model could help assess how medications impact fetal kidneys during pregnancy and move science closer to repairing or replacing damaged kidney tissue with lab-grown cells.
The discovery came days after researchers from Hebrew University of Jerusalem and international partners discovered a way to boost the immune system’s cancer-fighting ability by reprogramming how T cells, which are white blood cells critical to the immune system, produce energy.
The researchers explained in a study published in the peer-reviewed Nature Communications that disabling a protein known as Ant2 in T cells greatly enhances their effectiveness against tumors.
“By disabling Ant2, we triggered a complete shift in how T cells produce and use energy,” Prof. Michael Berger of Hebrew University’s Faculty of Medicine, who co-led the study with doctorate student Omri Yosef, told the Tazpit Press Service. “This reprogramming made them significantly better at recognizing and killing cancer cells.”
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Netherlands to Push EU to Suspend Israel Trade Deal but Won’t Recognize Palestinian State ‘At This Time’
Netherlands Foreign Affairs Minister Caspar Veldkamp addresses a press conference, in New Delhi on April 1, 2025. Photo: ANI Photo/Sanjay Sharma via Reuters Connect
The Netherlands is spearheading efforts to suspend the European Union-Israel trade agreement amid rising EU criticism of Israel’s actions in Gaza, while simultaneously refusing to recognize a Palestinian state, contrasting with other member states as international pressure mounts.
On Thursday, Dutch Foreign Minister Caspar Veldkamp announced that the Netherlands will push the EU to suspend the trade component of the EU-Israel Association Agreement — a pact governing the EU’s political and economic ties with the Jewish state.
This latest anti-Israel initiative follows a recent EU-commissioned report accusing Israel of committing “indiscriminate attacks … starvation … torture … [and] apartheid” against Palestinians in Gaza during its military campaign against Hamas, an internationally designated terrorist group.
Following calls from a majority of EU member states for a formal investigation, this report built on Belgium’s recent decision to review Israel’s compliance with the trade agreement, a process initiated by the Netherlands and led by EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Kaja Kallas.
According to the report, “there are indications that Israel would be in breach of its human rights obligations” under the 25-year-old EU-Israel Association Agreement.
While the document acknowledges the reality of violence by Hamas, it states that this issue lies outside its scope — failing to address the Palestinian terrorist group’s role in sparking the current war with its bloody rampage across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
Israeli officials have slammed the report as factually incorrect and morally flawed, noting that Hamas embeds its military infrastructure within civilian targets and Israel’s army takes extensive precautions to try and avoid civilian casualties.
In a Dutch parliamentary debate on Gaza on Thursday, Veldkamp also announced that the government would not recognize a Palestinian state for now — a position that stands in sharp contrast to the recent moves by several other EU member states to extend recognition.
“The Netherlands is not planning to recognize a Palestinian state at this time,” the Dutch diplomat said.
“This war has ceased to be a just war and is now leading to the erosion of Israel’s own security and identity,” he continued.
This latest decision goes against the position of several EU member states, including France, which has committed to recognizing Palestinian statehood in September.
The United Kingdom has likewise indicated it will do so unless Israel acts to ease the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and agrees to a ceasefire.
For its part, Germany said it was not planning to recognize a Palestinian state in the short term, and Italy argued that recognition must occur simultaneously with the recognition of Israel by the new entity.
Spain, Norway, Ireland, and Slovenia all recognized a Palestinian state last year.
Israel has been facing growing pressure from several EU member states seeking to undermine its defensive campaign against the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas in Gaza.
On Thursday, European Commission Vice President Teresa Ribera strongly condemned Israel’s actions in the war-torn enclave, describing the situation as a “grave violation of human dignity.”
“What we are seeing is a concrete population being targeted, killed and condemned to starve to death,” Ribera told Politico. “If it is not genocide, it looks very much like the definition used to express its meaning.”
Until now, the European Commission has refrained from accusing Israel of genocide, but Ribera’s comments mark one of the strongest European condemnations since the outbreak of the war in Gaza.
She also called on the EU to take decisive action by considering the suspension of its trade agreement with Israel and the implementation of sanctions, while emphasizing that such measures would require unanimous approval from all member states.
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Graduate Student Unions Promoting Antisemitism, Reform Group Says
Students listen to a speech at a protest encampment at Stanford University in Stanford, California US, on April 26, 2024. Photo: Carlos Barria via Reuters Connect.
Higher-education-based unions controlled by United Electrical, Radio, and Machine Workers of America (UE) are rife with antisemitism and anti-Zionist discrimination, according to a new letter imploring the US Congress’s House Committee on Education and the Workforce to address the matter.
“Tracing its roots to communism in the 1930s, the UE is a radical, pro-Hamas labor union that has a long history of antisemitism,” the National Right to Work Foundation (NRTW), one of the US’s leading labor reform groups, wrote on July 30 in a message obtained by The Algemeiner. “The UE openly supports the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement, which is designed to cripple and destroy Israel economically. Today, the UE furthers its antisemitic agenda by unionizing graduate students on college campuses and using its exclusive representation powers to create a hostile environment for Jewish students. The hostile environment includes demanding compulsory dues to fund the UE’s abhorrent activities.”
NRTW went on to describe a litany of alleged injustices to which UE members subject Jewish student-employees in the US’s most prestigious institutions of higher education, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to Cornell University. At MIT, the letter said, “union officers” aided a riotous group which illegally occupied a section of campus with a “Gaza Solidarity Encampment,” participating in the demonstration and even denying access to campus buildings. UE members at Stanford University, meanwhile, allegedly denied religious accommodations to Jewish students who requested exemption from union dues over that branch’s supporting the BDS movement. And Cornell University UE was accused of denying religious exemptions in several cases as well and followed up the rejection with an intrusive “questionnaire” which probed Jewish students for “legally-irrelevant information.”
The situation requires federal oversight and intervention, NRTW said, including Congress’s possibly clarifying that student-employees are not traditional employees and are therefore afforded protections under sections of the Civil Rights Act which apply to the campus.
“These continuing patterns of antisemitism are illegal, immoral, and must be stopped,” the letter continued. “We encourage you to do all that is in your power to investigate and help bring an end to the UE and its affiliates’ nonstop harassment and intimidation of Jewish students … The Trump administration can also use tools available to it under Title VI and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act against colleges who work with unions to create a hostile environment for Jewish students.”
July’s letter is not the first time NRTW has publicized alleged antisemitic abuse in unions representing higher education employees.
In 2024, it represented a group of six City University of New York (CUNY) professors, five of whom are Jewish, who sued to be “freed” from CUNY’s Professional Staff Congress (PSC-CUNY) over its passing a resolution during Israel’s May 2021 war with Hamas which declared solidarity with Palestinians and accused the Jewish state of ethnic cleansing, apartheid, and crimes against humanity. The group contested New York State’s “Taylor Law,” which it said chained the professors to the union’s “bargaining unit” and denied their right to freedom of speech and association by forcing them to be represented in negotiations by an organization they claim holds antisemitic views.
That same year, NRTW prevailed in a discrimination suit filed to exempt another cohort of Jewish MIT students from paying dues to the Graduate Student Union (GSU). The students had attempted to resist financially supporting GSU’s anti-Zionism, but the union bosses attempted to coerce their compliance, telling them that “no principles, teachings, or tenets of Judaism prohibit membership in or the payment of dues or fees” to the union.
“All Americans should have a right to protect their money from going to union bosses they don’t support, whether those objections are based on religion, politics, or any other reason,” NRTW said at the time.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.