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      Netanyahu’s Road Through Israel’s History, in Pictures

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      “Bibi, King of Israel!”That is a shout from his fervent supporters that might have given pause to King David, let alone King Solomon. But Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister, has finally lost his job, unable to cobble together a final majority in the Knesset after four elections in the last two years.The government that has now replaced him is fragile, however. Little holds it together except a desire to get Mr. Netanyahu out of office, where he will no longer be immune from punishment, if convicted, over charges of corruption.But Mr. Netanyahu still appears to rule Israel’s largest party, Likud, and given Israel’s riven politics, his fall may only be a sort of sabbatical.Whatever the criticism of his actions and political cynicism, Mr. Netanyahu’s career represents an extraordinary accomplishment for a man who grew up in the shadow of a difficult and demanding father and a hero brother, killed at the age of 30 in command of one of Israel’s most storied military ventures, Operation Entebbe. The 1976 operation rescued hostages held at Entebbe Airport in Uganda.Both brothers served in the military’s elite commando unit, Sayeret Matkal. But Bibi survived to put a more lasting stamp on the young state through his political and economic policies, his toughness toward rivals. He has an instinctive sense of what drives Israelis — the search for security in one of the most unstable regions of the world, a Jewish state built on the remnants the Nazis left behind, in the midst of an Arab and Iranian sea.Mr. Netanyahu, right, during a training exercise as a member of the Israeli Army’s Sayeret Matkal commando unit.Israeli Government Press OfficeIsraeli troops patrol fields around a hijacked Sabena aircraft in Tel Aviv in 1972. Mr. Netanyahu’s commando unit, led by Ehud Barak, another future prime minister, rescued the passengers from hijackers.Associated PressMr. Netanyahu with his daughter Noa in 1980.Israeli Government Press OfficeMr. Netanyahu’s path to leadership was not an obvious one. Born in Israel, he grew up partly in the United States, where his father, a deeply conservative scholar of Judaic history, was teaching.He returned to Israel after high school, fluent in English, to make a distinguished career as a commando in Sayaret Matkal, where he rose to captain and was wounded several times.He then returned to the United States, using the more Anglicized name Ben Nitay (later changed to Benjamin Ben Nitai) to get degrees in architecture and business management. By 1978, he was already appearing on American television, where his English made him an ideal guest to discuss Israel.He found his way into diplomacy and politics in the early 1980s, when he was appointed deputy chief of mission to the Israeli Embassy in Washington. He then served as ambassador to the United Nations before returning to Israel to enter politics in earnest.He joined the Likud in 1988 and was elected to Parliament.Mr. Netanyahu, accompanied by Government Secretary Elyakim Rubinstein, on a flight from New York to Washington in 1989, when Mr. Netanyahu served as deputy foreign minister.Israeli Government Press OfficeRight-wing activists pasting campaign posters for Mr. Netanyahu over campaign posters for Prime Minister Shimon Peres in May 1996, before the election that would bring Mr. Netanyahu to power.David Silverman/ReutersBenjamin and Sara Netanyahu in Jerusalem on election day in 1996.Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesBy 1993, he was the leader of Likud and was a strong critic of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin of the Labor party and his willingness to give up territory to reach peace with the Palestinians in the Oslo accords. After Mr. Rabin was assassinated in 1995, Mr. Netanyahu was criticized for language approaching incitement, a charge he said he found deeply wounding.But he defeated Washington’s favorite candidate, Shimon Peres, in the 1996 elections by pushing the theme of security in the midst of a badly managed conflict with Lebanon and a series of terrorist bombings by Palestinian groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad. He became the youngest prime minister in Israeli history and the first to be born in the independent state.That same year, 1996, Mr. Netanyahu represented Israel for the first time in summit meetings organized by President Clinton, who was eager to build on Oslo to create a more lasting peace.Then and later, in the 1998 Wye River summit, Mr. Netanyahu proved a difficult partner. He was willing to appeal to American Jews and Israel supporters in Congress to heighten political pressure on Mr. Clinton not to press Israel to go farther than he judged wise.His relations with the Palestinian leader, Yasir Arafat, were always tense, and the two never came to trust one another enough to reach the peace that Mr. Clinton thought was within grasp.Vice President Al Gore watching as Yasir Arafat, King Hussein of Jordan, President Clinton and Mr. Netanyahu leave the Oval Office after a Middle East summit meeting in 1996.Paul Hosefros/The New York TimesThe Israeli and Palestinian leaders failed to resolve any of their differences during the two-day summit.Doug Mills/Associated PressSurrounded by security personnel, Mr. Netanyahu, with his wife Sara and son Avner, spent a holiday at the beach in Caesarea in August 1997.Shaul Golan/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesWhile Mr. Netanyahu did much to reform Israel’s economy, charges of corruption, both large and petty, surrounded him and hurt his popularity.After the failure of his Labor Party successor, Ehud Barak, to reach peace with the Palestinians at long meetings at Camp David and again, just before Mr. Clinton left office, Mr. Netanyahu returned to politics. But he lost out to Ariel Sharon, then went on to serve in his cabinet. After a period in opposition, Mr. Netanyahu became prime minister again in 2009 and has remained in office since.But his relations with American presidents continued to be fraught, and he and President Obama developed a deep mutual disdain.Mr. Obama pushed too hard too early to try to get Israel to stop settlement building in the occupied West Bank, while Mr. Netanyahu believed that Mr. Obama was putting Israel at an existential risk by trying to do a deal with Iran to curb its nuclear program.While Iran denied it was aiming to develop nuclear weapons, Mr. Netanyahu compared the threat of Iran to Israel and the Jews to the late 1930s in Europe, when Hitler took power.He tried to defeat the deal in every setting, from the United Nations, where he famously held up a cartoon bomb with a thick red line representing Iranian uranium enrichment, to the U.S. Congress itself, where he remained very popular, especially among Republicans.During his second tenure as prime minister, Mr. Netanyahu had an icy relationship with President Obama.Stephen Crowley/The New York TimesThe Iron Dome defense system being used to intercept incoming missiles fired from Gaza by Hamas militants in 2012.Tsafrir Abayov/Associated PressMr. Netanyahu, famous for his use of visual aids, displaying his red line for Iran’s nuclear program at the United Nations in 2012.Chang W. Lee/The New York TimesMr. Netanyahu also dealt with the aftermath of Mr. Sharon’s decision to pull Israeli troops and settlers out of the Gaza Strip, a step he opposed. Mr. Sharon dumped the keys to Gaza in the street, but they were picked up by the more radical Hamas, which seized control of the Palestinian territory from the more moderate Fatah faction led by Mr. Arafat’s successor, Mahmoud Abbas.Under Mr. Netanyahu, Israel made regular raids and airstrikes to try to stop rockets from Gaza hitting southern Israel, prompting criticism about the deaths of Palestinian civilians in a place many compared to an open-air prison, largely sealed off from the world by Israel and Egypt.But Mr. Netanyahu has refrained from any comprehensive re-invasion of Gaza and has had quiet talks through Egyptian mediators with Hamas to try to keep Gaza from imploding and dragging Israel into a larger war, especially another one with the Iranian-armed Hezbollah militia in southern Lebanon.In the occupied West Bank, however, Israel continued to build a separation barrier between the Palestinians and ever-expanding settlements beyond the so-called Green Line, which delineated Israel’s boundaries under the 1949 armistice until the 1967 Arab-Israeli war..css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-3btd0c{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-3btd0c{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-3btd0c strong{font-weight:600;}.css-3btd0c em{font-style:italic;}.css-w739ur{margin:0 auto 5px;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-w739ur{font-family:nyt-cheltenham,georgia,’times new roman’,times,serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.375rem;line-height:1.625rem;}@media (min-width:740px){#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-w739ur{font-size:1.6875rem;line-height:1.875rem;}}@media 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ease;transition:all 0.5s ease;-webkit-transform:rotate(180deg);-ms-transform:rotate(180deg);transform:rotate(180deg);}.css-eb027h{max-height:5000px;-webkit-transition:max-height 0.5s ease;transition:max-height 0.5s ease;}.css-6mllg9{-webkit-transition:all 0.5s ease;transition:all 0.5s ease;position:relative;opacity:0;}.css-6mllg9:before{content:”;background-image:linear-gradient(180deg,transparent,#ffffff);background-image:-webkit-linear-gradient(270deg,rgba(255,255,255,0),#ffffff);height:80px;width:100%;position:absolute;bottom:0px;pointer-events:none;}.css-uf1ume{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-box-pack:justify;-webkit-justify-content:space-between;-ms-flex-pack:justify;justify-content:space-between;}.css-wxi1cx{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-flex-direction:column;-ms-flex-direction:column;flex-direction:column;-webkit-align-self:flex-end;-ms-flex-item-align:end;align-self:flex-end;}.css-12vbvwq{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;box-sizing:border-box;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-12vbvwq{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-12vbvwq:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-12vbvwq{border:none;padding:10px 0 0;border-top:2px solid #121212;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-qjk116{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-qjk116 strong{font-weight:700;}.css-qjk116 em{font-style:italic;}.css-qjk116 a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-underline-offset:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-thickness:1px;text-decoration-thickness:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#326891;text-decoration-color:#326891;}.css-qjk116 a:visited{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#326891;text-decoration-color:#326891;}.css-qjk116 a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}Mr. Netanyahu increasingly depended on political support from Israelis who supported the settlement expansion and their eventual annexation, which he threatened but never carried out.At the same time, he has been making inroads with other Sunni Arab nations despite the continuing decline in relations with the Palestinians, pushing Israel’s solidarity with them against Iran. One of his great accomplishments, working with President Trump, were the Abraham Accords, which opened normal diplomatic relations with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco.Those accords survived the most recent exchange of fire last month with Hamas in Gaza, an 11-day clash that seemed, for now, to put the Palestinian issue back on the table. But even that conflict did not save Mr. Netanyahu.An Israeli tank near the town of Sderot at the border with Gaza during the seven-week war with Hamas in 2014.Sergey Ponomarev for The New York TimesMr. Netanyahu at the Knesset, Israel’s Parliament.Lior Mizrahi/Getty ImagesMr. Netanyahu visiting the border fence between Israel and Jordan in 2016.Pool photo by Marc Israel SellemSome say that Mr. Netanyahu has sought his whole life to grow out of shadow of his brother and to make his own mark on Israeli history. There are streets all over Israel named after Yonatan Netanyahu.Only when Mr. Netanyahu’s father, hawkish and dominating, died in 2012 at the age of 102, Israelis said the prime minister could feel liberated enough to try to make peace with the Palestinians.But that has been a hope long deferred, as previous efforts at peace have proven hollow. Both the Israelis and Palestinians have pulled back from the deeply difficult compromises, both territorial and religious, that would be required for a lasting settlement of the unfinished war of 1948-49.Mr. Netanyahu, with his father, Benzion Netanyahu, visiting the grave of his brother Yoni at Mount Herzl in 2009 in Jerusalem. Yoni Netanyahu was killed during military operations in Uganda in July 1976.Amos Ben Gershom/Government Press OfficeHar Homa, a Jewish settlement in East Jerusalem, has more than 25,000 residents.Tomas Munita for The New York TimesMr. Netanyahu used one of the most prominent platforms in the world, the United States Congress, to warn against what he called a “bad deal” being negotiated with Iran to freeze its nuclear program in 2015.Doug Mills/The New York TimesMr. Netanyahu was an early supporter of Mr. Trump and his presidency was a triumph for the Israeli leader. Having the support of an American president is crucial for Israelis and Mr. Netanyahu campaigned on his strong relationship with Mr. Trump.Mr. Trump pulled the United States out of the Iran deal and, in an obvious effort to help Mr. Netanyahu in this latest campaign, moved the American Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and recognized Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights, captured from Syria in the 1967 war.But Mr. Trump’s defeat was a blow to Mr. Netanyahu. President Biden is trying to restore the Iran nuclear deal over fierce Israeli objections, intervened to press Mr. Netanyahu to bring an end to the latest Gaza clash and has repeated his support for a negotiated, two-state solution to the Palestinian issue.After President Trump’s election in 2016, Mr. Netanyahu found an ally in the White House.Stephen Crowley/The New York TimesProtesters seen through a banner showing Mr. Netanyahu in 2018.Oded Balilty/Associated PressMr. Netanyahu visiting a market in Jerusalem in 2019 during his campaign for a fifth term as prime minister.Dan Balilty for The New York TimesMr. Netanyahu remained in power so long not because Israelis think he is the nicest or cleanest man in the kingdom, but because they believed that he kept them safe and made them wealthier, and that he has succeeded in maintaining Israel’s security while reducing its isolation in the region.Mr. Netanyahu celebrating an election victory in 2020.Dan Balilty for The New York TimesMr. Netanyahu, right, with his lawyer at the Jerusalem district court in February during a hearing in his corruption trial.Pool photo by Reuven CastroIsrael’s Iron Dome missile defense system lights up the sky over Tel Aviv as it tries to intercept rockets fired from Gaza during the war last month.Corinna Kern for The New York TimesWhether or not he ever returns to power again, after Mr. Netanyahu dies, there will be many streets named after him, too.Benjamin Netanyahu shakes hands with the new prime minister, Naftali Bennett, after the Knesset approved the new coalition government on Sunday.Ronen Zvulun/Reuters More

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      How Naftali Bennett, Head of a Small Right-Wing Party in Israel, Rose to the Top

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      The energetic leader of the small, right-wing Yamina party has managed to leverage his modest electoral gain for a shot at the top job.JERUSALEM — The morning after Donald J. Trump’s victory in the 2016 presidential election, Naftali Bennett, the energetic leader of a relatively small, Israeli pro-settlement party, exulted before an audience of foreign reporters in Jerusalem, “The era of a Palestinian state is over!”Now, Mr. Bennett, 49, a former high-tech entrepreneur who insists that there must never be a full-fledged Palestinian state and that Israel should annex much of the occupied West Bank, is poised to become Israel’s next prime minister, replacing Benjamin Netanyahu.Mr. Bennett, a former ally of Mr. Netanyahu often described as more right wing than the prime minister, is the independently wealthy son of American immigrants. He first entered the Israeli Parliament eight years ago and is relatively unknown and inexperienced on the international stage, leaving much of the world — not to mention many Israelis — wondering what kind of leader he might be.Shifting between seemingly contradictory alliances, he has been called a right-wing extremist, a pragmatist and an opportunist.But in a measure of his talents, he has now pulled off a feat that is extraordinary even by the perplexing standards of Israeli politics: He has maneuvered himself into the top office even though his party, Yamina, won just seven of the 120 seats in the Parliament.A canny and ambitious beneficiary of Israel’s prolonged political morass, Mr. Bennett leveraged his modest but pivotal electoral weight after the inconclusive March election, Israel’s fourth in two years. He entered coalition talks as a kingmaker, and emerged as the one wearing the crown.In a career full of paradoxes, Mr. Bennett, once a top aide to Mr. Netanyahu, 71, played a crucial role in toppling his former boss, Israel’s longest-serving leader. As a result, Mr. Netanyahu was brought down — for now, at least — not only by his longtime rivals on the center and left of the political spectrum but also by someone considered even more hard-line.Naftali Bennett, left, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in 2020.  Sebastian Scheiner/Associated PressMr. Bennett has long championed West Bank settlers and once led the council representing them, but he has never been a settler, himself, and lives in Ra’anana, an affluent town in central Israel, with his wife and four children. He is religiously observant — he would be the first prime minister to wear a kipa — but he will head a governing coalition that is largely secular.He is best known for views on settlements, annexation and Palestinian statehood that many on Israel’s left and center — not to mention much of the world — consider not just wrong but dangerous. Yet his coalition spans Israel’s fractious political spectrum from left to right, and relies on the support of a small Arab, Islamist party.That coalition proposes to paper over its differences on Israeli-Palestinian relations by focusing on domestic matters.Mr. Bennett has explained his motives for teaming up with such ideological opposites as an act of last resort to end the political impasse that has paralyzed Israel.“The political crisis in Israel is unprecedented on a global level,” he said in a televised speech on Sunday. “We could end up with fifth, sixth, even 10th elections, dismantling the walls of the country, brick by brick, until our house falls in on us. Or we can stop the madness and take responsibility.”Now Mr. Bennett faces the greatest challenge of his political career, trying to hold that unlikely coalition together, to vault from being a second-tier figure to a national leader, and to maintain relations with Israel’s most important ally, the United States. President Biden has been cooler toward Mr. Netanyahu than Mr. Trump was.“There will be, I think, a collective sigh of relief within the Biden administration that they have new, young Israeli blood to deal with,” said Martin S. Indyk, a former U.S. ambassador to Israel and a former special envoy for Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.Mr. Bennett will be pressured by the settler right to deliver for them, Mr. Indyk said, but it appears that “he has already accepted that he won’t be able to pursue that agenda.”He campaigned as the right-wing alternative to Mr. Netanyahu, who has held power for 12 years consecutively and 15 years overall, and is now standing trial on corruption charges. They have often differed more in tone than substance, as Mr. Bennett avoided the inflammatory language and long-running legal drama of his predecessor.Aida Touma-Sliman, a lawmaker from the Joint List of predominantly Arab parties, wrote on Twitter that Mr. Bennett would lead “a dangerous right-wing government,” one that would “remove Netanyahu and preserve his path.”After Mr. Bennett described Mr. Netanyahu on Sunday as a divisive and polarizing force, Mr. Netanyahu accused his former aide of using “the same hollow slogans about hate and division,” and of “committing the fraud of the century.”People who know him describe Mr. Bennett as likable and tolerant behind closed doors, a pragmatist at heart, though how that private person would translate to governing remains to be seen.Mr. Bennett, then serving as the economy minister and head of the Jewish Home Party, posing with high school students in 2015.Uriel Sinai for The New York Times“People think he’s a fanatic. He’s not,” said Ayelet Frish, an Israeli political consultant. She said Mr. Bennett once told her that he had grown up in a home of “Woodstock parents,” surrounded by mostly secular culture, and noted his time in the largely secular high-tech business world.Orit Galili-Zucker, a former strategic communications adviser to Mr. Netanyahu, said Mr. Bennett aimed “to present an alternative to Netanyahu’s toxic discourse.”In Mr. Bennett’s first campaign, in 2013, Mr. Netanyahu’s Likud party branded him as “a dangerous, messianic right-winger,” she said. Now Likud was calling him a “dangerous leftist,” she noted, for joining forces with the opposition leader Yair Lapid to unseat Mr. Netanyahu.Now Likud and its staunch ultra-Orthodox allies will be heading into the opposition.Under the new coalition’s government, Mr. Bennett will serve as prime minister for the first part of a four-year term, to be followed by the secular, centrist Mr. Lapid. By conceding the first turn in the rotation, Mr. Lapid smoothed the way for other right-wing politicians to join the anti-Netanyahu alliance..css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-3btd0c{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-3btd0c{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-3btd0c strong{font-weight:600;}.css-3btd0c em{font-style:italic;}.css-w739ur{margin:0 auto 5px;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-w739ur{font-family:nyt-cheltenham,georgia,’times new roman’,times,serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.375rem;line-height:1.625rem;}@media (min-width:740px){#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-w739ur{font-size:1.6875rem;line-height:1.875rem;}}@media (min-width:740px){.css-w739ur{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.4375rem;}}.css-9s9ecg{margin-bottom:15px;}.css-16ed7iq{width:100%;display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-align-items:center;-webkit-box-align:center;-ms-flex-align:center;align-items:center;-webkit-box-pack:center;-webkit-justify-content:center;-ms-flex-pack:center;justify-content:center;padding:10px 0;background-color:white;}.css-pmm6ed{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-align-items:center;-webkit-box-align:center;-ms-flex-align:center;align-items:center;}.css-pmm6ed > :not(:first-child){margin-left:5px;}.css-5gimkt{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:0.8125rem;font-weight:700;-webkit-letter-spacing:0.03em;-moz-letter-spacing:0.03em;-ms-letter-spacing:0.03em;letter-spacing:0.03em;text-transform:uppercase;color:#333;}.css-5gimkt:after{content:’Collapse’;}.css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transition:all 0.5s ease;transition:all 0.5s ease;-webkit-transform:rotate(180deg);-ms-transform:rotate(180deg);transform:rotate(180deg);}.css-eb027h{max-height:5000px;-webkit-transition:max-height 0.5s ease;transition:max-height 0.5s ease;}.css-6mllg9{-webkit-transition:all 0.5s ease;transition:all 0.5s ease;position:relative;opacity:0;}.css-6mllg9:before{content:”;background-image:linear-gradient(180deg,transparent,#ffffff);background-image:-webkit-linear-gradient(270deg,rgba(255,255,255,0),#ffffff);height:80px;width:100%;position:absolute;bottom:0px;pointer-events:none;}.css-uf1ume{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-box-pack:justify;-webkit-justify-content:space-between;-ms-flex-pack:justify;justify-content:space-between;}.css-wxi1cx{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-flex-direction:column;-ms-flex-direction:column;flex-direction:column;-webkit-align-self:flex-end;-ms-flex-item-align:end;align-self:flex-end;}.css-12vbvwq{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;box-sizing:border-box;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-12vbvwq{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-12vbvwq:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-12vbvwq{border:none;padding:10px 0 0;border-top:2px solid #121212;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-qjk116{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-qjk116 strong{font-weight:700;}.css-qjk116 em{font-style:italic;}.css-qjk116 a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-underline-offset:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-thickness:1px;text-decoration-thickness:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#326891;text-decoration-color:#326891;}.css-qjk116 a:visited{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#326891;text-decoration-color:#326891;}.css-qjk116 a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}Mr. Bennett represents a new generation in Israeli politics and would be the second-youngest prime minister in the country’s history; only Mr. Netanyahu, when he first came into the office a generation ago, was younger.Born in Israel, Mr. Bennett spent parts of his childhood living in the United States and Canada. He served in the same Israeli Army commando unit Mr. Netanyahu had. He then moved to New York and founded a software company that he later sold for $145 million, and served as chief executive of another company.He has had a fraught relationship with Mr. Netanyahu since a stint as his chief of staff ended in acrimony in 2008. A sharp critic of some of Mr. Netanyahu’s policies, he nevertheless sat in several Netanyahu-led governments as a minister, as well as in the opposition. In late 2019, Mr. Netanyahu appointed him as defense minister to keep Mr. Bennett on his side at a time of political turmoil, and he served in that role for about six months.Mr. Bennett at the Western Wall in Jerusalem ahead of parliamentary elections in 2013.Ammar Awad/ReutersOver the past decade, Mr. Bennett and his senior partner in Yamina, Ayelet Shaked, have run for office in an array of right-wing, pro-settlement parties with a dizzying series of name changes and allies. In 2013, when they were a pair of political newcomers, he formed what was seen as a surprising alliance with Mr. Lapid.Mr. Bennett has often punched above his weight on security issues. On the eve of the 2014 Gaza war, he presciently raised the threat arising from tunnels dug by Hamas beneath the Gaza-Israel border and pressed for a plan of action to neutralize them.Later that year, he wrote an uncompromising op-ed in The New York Times explaining his view that Israel could not allow the creation of a Palestinian state. He has proposed granting the Palestinians “a sort of autonomy on steroids” in about 40 percent of the West Bank, and gradually applying Israeli sovereignty in the rest of the territory — a move much of the world would consider illegal.The next year he wrote another op-ed forcefully condemning Jewish extremists who had stabbed participants at a gay pride parade in Jerusalem and burned three members of a Palestinian family to death in a West Bank village, denouncing the perpetrators as “terrorists.”At times, Mr. Bennett and Ms. Shaked joined forces with more radical political factions in the religious Zionist camp who are heavily influenced by their rabbis. Running as the New Right party in the April 2019 election, without their more extreme partners, they failed to gain enough votes to enter Parliament.In the run-up to this year’s election, the pair tried to broaden their appeal to more mainstream Israelis, and had more success, gathering some support from disaffected former Netanyahu voters. Mr. Bennett has been pushing a program for economic reform that he calls his “Singapore Plan,” supports curbing the powers of the judiciary and has criticized the present government’s handling of the pandemic.After the election, neither the pro-Netanyahu bloc of parties nor the anti-Netanyahu group could form a parliamentary majority without his party. Both sides courted him, offering him a chance to serve as prime minister in a rotation agreement. Mr. Bennett made it clear he would have preferred to join a right-wing government, but Mr. Netanyahu proved unable to form one. More

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      Palestinian Vote Delayed, Prolonging Split for West Bank and Gaza

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      President Mahmoud Abbas said elections could not take place unless Israel allowed voting in East Jerusalem. But privately, he also fears a poor result for his party, officials said.JERUSALEM — When the Palestinian Authority called in January for parliamentary elections, many Palestinians hoped the vote — the first in the occupied territories since 2006 — would revive Palestinian discourse, re-energize the independence movement and end a 14-year division between Palestinian leaders in the occupied West Bank and Gaza.But those hopes were dashed Thursday night when President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority announced that the vote, scheduled for May 22, would be delayed indefinitely.The news compounded an unsettled political dynamic across the occupied territories and the state of Israel, where both Israeli and Palestinian societies remain racked by political stalemate and division, where tensions are rising in Jerusalem and Gaza, and a return to peace negotiations appears less likely than ever.The official reason for the postponement was the refusal by the Israeli government to confirm that it would allow voting in East Jerusalem, which was annexed by Israel after the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. East Jerusalem is mainly populated by Palestinians who participate in elections for the Palestinian Authority, a semiautonomous institution that exerts partial jurisdiction in other parts of the occupied territories.“We decided to postpone the legislative elections until guaranteeing that Jerusalem and its people take part,” said Mr. Abbas in a speech in Ramallah. “We don’t give up Jerusalem.”But the postponement also served another purpose: Mr. Abbas was concerned that if the election went ahead, his party, Fatah, might lose ground to two Fatah splinter groups, according to a Palestinian official and a Western diplomat briefed by the Palestinian leadership.A family in a Gaza Strip refugee camp watching  President Mahmoud Abbas announce the election delay Thursday.Said Khatib/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesIsraeli officials, meanwhile, were concerned that the elections would lead to a greater role in the Palestinian leadership for Hamas, the militant Islamist group that wrested control of Gaza from Mr. Abbas in 2007, and which has never recognized Israel.“It is a big mistake to go to these elections,” Kamil Abu Rokon, an Israeli general who oversaw administrative aspects of the occupation until earlier this month, said shortly before leaving his post. “My recommendation is not to cooperate.”Analysts also said the Israeli leaders were happy to keep their Palestinian counterparts divided, since it undermines the Palestinians’ ability to pursue a final status agreement with Israel as a unified bloc.Hamas condemned Mr. Abbas’s decision, describing it as a “coup” that lacked popular support.The development comes amid a volatile period across the West Bank, Gaza and the state of Israel. Israeli politics is also at an impasse, following an election in March — Israel’s fourth in two years — in which both Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his opponents failed to win a workable majority.In Jerusalem, the situation is tense, following a march last week by far-right Jewish supremacists who chanted “Death to Arabs,” attacks on both Palestinians and Jews, and the provocative Israeli decision, now rescinded, to close a central plaza in East Jerusalem where Palestinians enjoy gathering during the ongoing month of Ramadan.That unrest broke months of relative calm in Gaza, where militants fired dozens of rockets toward Israel last weekend to protest the situation in Jerusalem.The city is at the heart of the pretext provided by Mr. Abbas to postpone elections.Under the interim agreements signed in the 1990s between Israeli and Palestinian leaders known as the Oslo Accords, the Israeli government is obliged to allow Palestinian elections in East Jerusalem.President Mahmoud Abbas casting a ballot in the Palestinian parliamentary elections in 2006, the last time elections were held.Muhammed Muheisen/Associated PressBut Israel has neither blocked the election nor agreed to allow it. The Israeli government has not made a decision either way, an Israeli official confirmed, despite requests by the Palestinian leadership. The Israeli police have detained several representatives of Palestinian parties who attempted to campaign in the city. Palestinian officials said that to proceed with an election without East Jerusalem would be tantamount to giving up Palestinian claims on the city and its sacred Islamic sites, including the Aqsa mosque.“It’s not that we are trying to avoid elections,” said Ziad Abu Amr, deputy prime minister of the Palestinian Authority, and an adviser to Mr. Abbas. “Jerusalem cannot be forsaken or abandoned. You can’t surrender to the fait accompli that Israel tries to impose on Jerusalem.”But insiders said Mr. Abbas had an ulterior motive for postponement.Long the engine of the Palestinian national movement, Mr. Abbas’s party, Fatah, now faces unprecedented challenges, not only from its longtime rival Hamas but also from ex-Fatah grandees whose campaigns chipped away at support for their former party.Were elections to go ahead, Fatah’s supporters would be forced to choose among three Fatah-linked factions — the official party; a splinter group led by an exiled former security chief, Muhammad Dahlan; and a second breakaway faction, headed by Nasser al-Kidwa, a former envoy to the United Nations, and Marwan Barghouti, a popular militant serving multiple life sentences in an Israeli prison for five counts of murder.In the most recent poll, Mr. Abbas’s faction still came out on top, with about a quarter of the vote. But it was projected to fall far short of an overall majority because nearly as many voters said they would vote for the rival Fatah groups. Hamas polled under nine percent.No Palestinian official would admit publicly this week that these factors affected Mr. Abbas’s thinking. But speaking on the condition of anonymity, a Palestinian official and a Western diplomat briefed by the Palestinians said that he feared losing influence to his former allies.And after Mr. Kidwa and Mr. Barghouti broke with Mr. Abbas in March, a senior Palestinian official said in an interview with The New York Times that the move put the elections at risk because it risked undermining Fatah.Supporters of an exiled former Fatah security chief, Mohammed Dahlan,  protesting the election delay in Gaza City on Thursday.Mohammed Abed/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images“Fatah’s situation needs to be strong, it needs to lead the Palestine Liberation Organization and the national project,” said Wassel Abu Yousef, a member of the executive committee of the P.L.O., the official representative of the Palestinian people. “If there is harm to the national project, there will be heavy and powerful voices that will be in favor of postponing the elections.”Some Palestinians met the postponement with a shrug. Many felt the elections would not have occurred in a particularly free environment, while some always suspected they would be canceled. Others felt voting for a Palestinian Parliament would have little effect on the biggest problem in their lives: the Israeli occupation.Elections suggest “there is a sovereign entity in which people are participating in a democratic process,” said Yara Hawari, a senior analyst at Al Shabaka, a Palestinian research group. “But you can’t have a full democracy under occupation.”Many Palestinians were nevertheless furious at being deprived of a rare chance to choose their representatives. Crowds of protesters, many of whom were too young to vote in the last Palestinian elections, demonstrated against the decision in both the West Bank and Gaza.“The people demand the ballot box,” they chanted.Muhammad Shehada, a 28-year-old unemployed civil engineer from Gaza City, called the decision “a big disappointment.” The situation in Jerusalem was no reason to cancel the elections, he said: “The occupation controls Jerusalem, whether the elections are held or not.”The lack of elections also raises the specter of intra-Palestinian violence, since different factions will now have no peaceful forum in which to air their grievances and express their frustrations, said Mkhaimar Abusada, a political scientist at Al Azhar University in Gaza City.“Many Palestinians were hoping that elections would ease the tension and friction between the factions,” said Dr. Abusada. But the election delay, he said, “will leave the Palestinians fighting against each other.”Iyad Abuhweila contributed reporting from Gaza City, and Irit Pazner Garshowitz from Jerusalem. More

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      John Brennan: Joe Biden Should Watch “The Present”

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      On a recent evening I watched “The Present,” a short film by Farah Nablusi, a Palestinian filmmaker, which was nominated for an Academy Award for live-action short film (the winner in the category was “Two Distant Strangers). Ms. Nablusi’s 25-minute film is a powerful, heartbreaking account of the travails of Yusuf, a Palestinian man, and Yasmine, his young daughter, as they traverse an Israeli military checkpoint in the West Bank twice in a single day.“The Present” establishes its context quickly, opening with images of Palestinian men making their way through a narrow passageway at one of the numerous checkpoints that dot the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Palestinians going to work, visiting family or shopping on the opposite side of a security barrier have to bear this humiliating procedure every day.Yusuf sets out with Yasmine to buy an anniversary gift for his wife. He is held in a chain-link holding pen. The ostensible reason is that the Israeli guards want to search him and his possessions more thoroughly. Yasmine sits nearby, watching and waiting in silence.The scene brought back memories of my first visit to the West Bank in 1975, when I crossed the Jordan River and arrived at an Israeli security post. As a student at the American University in Cairo, I was excited about visiting Jerusalem and spending Christmas Eve in Bethlehem. I joined a relatively short line, which moved at a steady and efficient pace.A few feet away, I could see men, women and children in a much longer line fully enclosed by steel mesh fencing labeled “Palestinians and Arabs.” I saw several subjected to discourtesy and aggressive searches by Israeli soldiers.While I was distressed by what I saw, I knew that Israel had legitimate security concerns in the aftermath of the 1967 and 1973 wars, worries that had been heightened by attacks on Israeli and Jewish targets by Palestinian terrorist organizations.Half a century has passed, and the political and security landscape of the Middle East has profoundly changed.Israel has signed peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan. The Abraham Accords, brokered by the United States last year, have paved the way for four more Arab states — the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco — to establish diplomatic relations with Israel. Hopefully, more Arab leaders will follow suit as there is no reason and little geostrategic sense in continuing to deny the reality and permanence of the state of Israel. (Unfortunately, the accords did nothing for the Palestinians except to obtain a suspension of Israeli plans to illegally annex the West Bank.)There also has been significant progress in reducing violence carried out by Palestinians inside and outside the occupied territories. The exception is Hamas, which continues to launch rocket attacks into Israel from the Gaza Strip.In the West Bank, Palestinian security and intelligence services have worked closely with their Israeli, Arab and Western counterparts to disrupt extremist networks and prevent attacks. These Palestinian agencies have demonstrated an impressive degree of professionalism over the past two decades.Despite sharply reduced tensions between Israel and the Arab world, the Palestinian people themselves have seen no appreciable progress in their quest to live in their own sovereign state. Political fissures and the ineffective political leadership of the Palestinian Authority have contributed to stymying ambitions for Palestinian nationhood.But that could change. Legislative elections in May and presidential elections in July in the West Bank and Gaza offer Palestinians an opportunity to elect representatives capable of conducting a more effectual political dialogue within the Palestinian homeland and beyond. Palestinian candidates who do not bear the sclerotic reputations of political incumbents, if elected, would help soften the deep-rooted cynicism that many Israeli officials display toward Palestinian negotiators.The major hurdle will be to reverse the trend of diminished interest that the Israeli government has shown in pursuing a two-state solution. Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has spearheaded relentless expansion of settlements in the West Bank. That expansion has brought along more concrete walls, security barriers and control points, further reducing the spaces where Palestinians can live, graze their flocks, tend their olive groves and vegetable gardens without being challenged by their occupiers.Unfortunately, during the Trump years, the United States ignored Palestinian interests and aspirations. Mr. Trump moved the American Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, rejecting the position of all previous U.S. administrations that it would endanger final status negotiations on that contested city. He senselessly severed funding to the Palestinian Authority and ended our contributions to the United Nations for Palestinian refugee assistance.In a welcome change, the Biden administration has authorized the release of $235 million for humanitarian, economic and development programs supporting Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza and elsewhere in the region.The concluding scene of “The Present” shows Yusuf, tired and hobbled with back pain, increasingly angry and on the verge of violence as he attempts to return home with the anniversary gift. His chilling, emotional outburst made me think of the frustration felt by every Palestinian who has to live with the stifling security measures and political oppression attendant to Israel’s military occupation.It was his little daughter, Yasmine, though, who gave me most pause and concern. She watched her father’s patience, dignity and humanity steadily erode.I can only imagine the imprint such experiences have on the young girls and boys who live in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. They grow up traumatized by injustice, discrimination and violence. They live with the feeling that their existence is controlled by people who don’t care about their welfare, their safety or their future.The Biden administration is dealing with a dizzying array of domestic and international problems but the Palestinian quest for statehood deserves the early engagement of his national security team. The United States needs to tell Israeli leaders to cease provocative settlement construction and the sort of oppressive security practices depicted in “The Present.”A clear signal from President Biden that he expects and is ready to facilitate serious Israeli-Palestinian discussions on a two-state solution would be of great political significance.John Brennan is a former director of the Central Intelligence Agency.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      Palestinian Militant Will Challenge Abbas’s Party in Election

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      Marwan Barghouti, who is imprisoned for murder, filed his own candidates for the Palestinian elections, posing a challenge to Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian Authority president.JERUSALEM — A popular Palestinian militant broke with the political party that controls the Palestinian Authority late Wednesday, escalating a power struggle and dimming the party’s hopes of retaining a monopoly on power in parliamentary elections.The militant, Marwan Barghouti, 61, was long a revered figure in Fatah, the secular party that runs the Palestinian Authority and was co-founded by Yasir Arafat, the former Palestinian leader. Though serving multiple life sentences in an Israeli prison for five counts of murder, Mr. Barghouti commands considerable respect among many party cadres and is considered a potential future candidate for Palestinian president.On Wednesday night, Fatah members acting on his behalf broke with the party, forming a separate electoral slate that will compete against Fatah in the elections in May and posing a direct challenge to Fatah’s 85-year-old leader, Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority.Mr. Barghouti’s faction joined forces with another longtime protagonist of Palestinian politics, Nasser al-Kidwa, a nephew of Mr. Arafat and a former Palestinian envoy to the United Nations, who split from Fatah this year.Analysts believe their alliance could split Fatah’s vote, possibly acting as a spoiler that could benefit Hamas, the Islamist militant group that controls Gaza.“This is a dramatic and major development,” said Ghaith al-Omari, a former adviser to Mr. Abbas and a senior analyst at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a research group in Washington. “This is as big of a challenge as can be raised to Abbas’s election strategy and more generally to his control over Fatah.”Mr. Abbas, who has led the Palestinian Authority for 16 years, called for new elections in January in the hope of reasserting his democratic legitimacy and re-establishing a unified Palestinian administration. The authority manages parts of the occupied West Bank, while Hamas runs the Gaza Strip.The authority has not held elections since 2006 for its parliament, the Palestinian Legislative Council. Mr. Abbas has repeatedly postponed them, at least partly because he feared losing to Hamas, which wrested control of the Gaza Strip from the Fatah-run Palestinian Authority in 2007.Mr. Abbas hoped new elections might finally lead to reconciliation with Hamas. Instead, they have exposed a major power struggle within Fatah itself.“This is one of the most significant political developments in Fatah since Abbas became president in 2005,” said Mr. al-Omari. “Barghouti and Kidwa are a combination that can’t be easily dismissed by the Fatah leadership. They have a very deep reservoir of legitimacy in the party and they represent a major challenge to Abbas’s hold on power in it.”Mr. Barghouti ran for president of the Palestinian Authority in 2004, before withdrawing and supporting Mr. Abbas. He had been a leader of the Palestinian uprisings in late 1980s and early 2000s, and was convicted in 2004 for involvement in the killings of five Israelis.He was sentenced to five life terms and campaigned for office from his jail cell.Fatah’s supporters will now be forced to choose among three Fatah-linked factions — the official party, the Barghouti-al-Kidwa alliance, and a third splinter group led by an exiled former security chief, Muhammad Dahlan.Members of Mr. Barghouti’s alliance said they had created the new faction to revitalize Palestinian politics, which has increasingly become a one-man show centered around Mr. Abbas, who has ruled by decree for more than a decade.“The Palestinian political system can no longer only be reformed,” said Hani al-Masri, a member of the new alliance, at a news briefing on Wednesday night. “It needs deep change.”A Fatah official dismissed the group as “turncoats.”“Even with our prophet Mohammed, there were turncoats,” said Jibril Rajoub, the secretary-general of the Fatah Central Committee, at a separate press briefing outside in Ramallah, West Bank. “Fatah is strong and sticking together.”Mr. Abbas has canceled elections in the past, and some believe he may seek to do so again in the coming weeks.But at this point, a cancellation would be “very expensive, politically,” said Ghassan Khatib, a Ramallah-based political analyst and a former minister under Mr. Abbas. “There is a high political price for that.”Mr. Abbas’s best hope would be for the Israeli authorities to intervene in the elections, Mr. Khatib said. Hamas has already accused Israel of arresting some of its leaders and warning them not to participate in the election, which Israel denies. And Palestinian officials say that the Israeli government has yet to respond to a request to allow voting in East Jerusalem.This dynamic that could give Mr. Abbas a pretext to cancel the vote.Mr. Abbas “needs an excuse that can justify such a decision,” Mr. Khatib said. More

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      Abbas Announces Palestinian Elections After Years of Paralysis

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyAbbas Announces Palestinian Elections After Years of ParalysisThe decree by President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority was viewed by analysts as a bid to lift his standing with the Biden administration. Skeptics expressed doubt the vote would happen.President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority in September. Mr. Abbas announced plans for presidential and parliamentary elections.Credit…Pool photo by Alaa BadarnehIsabel Kershner and Jan. 15, 2021Updated 8:18 p.m. ETJERUSALEM — Sixteen years after he was elected for what was meant to be a four-year term, President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority announced on Friday that presidential and parliamentary elections would be held in the spring and summer.The announcement appeared to be part of an effort to get the divided Palestinian house in order and project at least a semblance of unity as the Palestinian Authority prepares to repair ties with Washington and the incoming Biden administration after a disastrous few years of discord and disconnect under President Trump.The presidential decree stated that the voting for the long-defunct Palestinian Legislative Council would take place on May 22, followed by presidential elections on July 31. Mr. Abbas, 85, the leader of Fatah, the mainstream Palestinian party, was last elected to office in early 2005 after the death of his predecessor, Yasir Arafat.Analysts said they believed that Mr. Abbas was now seeking to renew his legitimacy in the eyes of the international community, especially with the imminent arrival of President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. in the White House, which they said Mr. Abbas hoped would herald a return to negotiations with Israel.“He doesn’t want to hear from anyone that he doesn’t represent the Palestinian people and that he’s not in control of Gaza,” said Jihad Harb, an expert on Palestinian politics.The last time the Palestinians went to the polls, it did not end happily.In 2006 a rival party representing Hamas, the Islamic militant group, trounced Fatah in elections for the Legislative Council, leading to a year and a half of uneasy power sharing.The United States and much of the West refused to work with the unity government because Hamas, which they considered a terrorist organization, would not accept international demands such as renouncing violence and recognizing Israel’s right to exist.A brief civil war between the two groups ensued in the coastal territory of Gaza. It ended in June 2007, with Hamas seizing control there after routing forces loyal to Mr. Abbas and confining his authority to parts of the occupied West Bank.Mr. Abbas responded by forming an emergency government based in the West Bank, but Hamas officials refused to recognize it. The political and geographical schism, as well as the collapse of a series of reconciliation agreements, has since stymied any semblance of a functioning democratic process.Supporters of Hamas celebrated in the southern Gaza Strip after a parliamentary victory in 2006.Credit…Shawn Baldwin for The New York TimesA behind-the-scenes succession race has long been underway in the Palestinian Authority, and Mr. Abbas said a few years ago that he did not want to run again for the presidency.But there was no hint on Friday he intended to step down, and the election announcement was greeted with a degree of skepticism because Mr. Abbas has in the past announced plans for elections that never took place.In February 2011, for example, Mr. Abbas announced that elections would be held in September of that year, but Hamas rejected the idea and they were called off.Hamas welcomed Mr. Abbas’s new decree, saying in a statement that it was keen to make the elections “successful.” It added that work was needed to create an atmosphere for free and fair elections, and that Hamas had shown what it called great flexibility in recent months “out of a belief that the decision belongs to the people.”Still, some analysts expressed significant doubts about whether Mr. Abbas was interested in ultimately allowing the elections to go ahead, and the two rival Palestinian factions have not explained publicly how they will hold elections while the West Bank and Gaza are ruled by the separate groups.“These decrees are just a maneuver to buy time,” said Ghaith al-Omari, a former adviser to Mr. Abbas and a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “The deep suspicion between Abbas and Hamas still holds, and the reasons that have prevented elections in the past are still unchanged.”Nabil Amr, a veteran figure in Fatah and a former information minister, described the elections decree as “a preliminary practical step.” But he warned that Palestinians who stood to lose from the elections could work to impede them. “There are Palestinians whose privileges will be taken away if the elections are held, so they will oppose it,” he said.It remains unclear whether Hamas will accept the authority of the court that Mr. Abbas plans to establish to adjudicate election disputes, how freely candidates will be able to campaign and whether Mr. Abbas will agree to allow Hamas’s security forces, which he considers illegitimate, to secure polling booths in Gaza.Israel may also decide to bar Palestinians from voting in Israeli-annexed East Jerusalem — a potential obstacle that Mr. Abbas has previously said would prevent elections from going forward.Azzam al-Ahmad, a member of the Fatah Central Committee, said Palestinian officials would ask Israel to refrain from “placing impediments” on the Palestinians voting in East Jerusalem, but added that he expected the Israelis would do so regardless.Both Hamas and Fatah are convinced that they need to hold to elections, said Ghassan Khatib, a political scientist at Birzeit University in the West Bank, but it was unclear what kind of an election it would be.“Will it be a real election, or will it be a staged election that will renew the legitimacy of the same old guards?” he said. “My fear is that it’s a kind of election that is not going to make any change — except that it will give the superficial impression that we are more legitimate now.”More broadly, he wondered how the election could be pulled off after such a long and bitter split.“How are we going to conduct an election where the political system is divided completely into two separate election systems, two judicial systems, two security apparatuses, two everythings?” Mr. Khatib said. “That’s the question everyone is asking.”Patrick Kingsley contributed reporting from Jerusalem and Mohammed Najib from Ramallah, West Bank.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Annexations in the West Bank: Europeans Need to Step Up

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      In the coming weeks, crucial decisions on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are likely to be made. After three rounds of elections and difficult tactical maneuvers, a coalition government under Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was recently sworn in. The coalition agreement between the main partners — Likud and the Blue and White party — stipulates that, […] More