What will another four years of Netanyahu mean for Israel?

Benjamin Netanyahu has been described as the magician of Israeli politics. That reputation appears to be intact after he swept to an unexpected victory in the country’s national elections. A series of exit polls released at the close of voting on Tuesday night suggested a tightly-run contest with the left-wing coalition opposing Netanyahu, headed by Isaac Herzog. But when the official results came in this next morning, there was a decisive result for Likud of 30 seats, six more than Herzog’s group. This means that it is almost certain that Netanyahu will serve a third consecutive term as prime minister. He is on course to beat David Ben Guiron’s record tenure.

This should be a cause of profound concern for anyone who wants to see peace in the region. Netanyahu, hardly a liberal to begin with, swerved sharply to the right in this election campaign. The strategy, a bid to attract the hard-line vote that has recently gone to pro-settlement ultra-nationalist and religious parties, appears to have been effective. Netanyahu said that if Likud won the election, he would never allow the creation of a Palestinian state, and that building in Occupied East Jerusalem would continue. While his behaviour in office has suggested that he has no real interest in peace negotiations or dismantling settlements, he has at least officially maintained a commitment to the two-state solution. His comments during this campaign directly repudiated the position he took in 2009, when he said that he did want to see a Palestinian state.

He also went on an openly racist rant against Israel’s Arab citizens, who make up 20 per cent of the population. He warned that they were being bussed to polling stations by left-wing parties and that this would “distort the true will of the Israelis” and “grant excessive power to the radical Arab list”, referring to a new alliance of Arab politicians. “Right-wing rule is in danger,” he said. “Arab voters are streaming in huge quantities to the polling stations.” It is difficult to imagine another world leader making such statements about a demographic of their populace without prompting international outrage. An editorial in the New York Times condemned Netanyahu in unusually strong terms, saying that his behaviour in the election campaign showed that “he has forfeited any claim to representing all Israelis”, and that he was “desperate and craven enough to pull out all the stops”.

Netanyahu’s return to power on a strong mandate granted by his open and definitive opposition to the creation of a Palestinian state will exacerbate western frustration with him and his government.

The two-state solution is a central policy for Washington and the EU. Tensions with US President Barack Obama are already high after the breakdown of US-brokered peace talks last year and high profile clashes over America’s negotiations with Iran. Netanyahu is determined to scupper any deal over Iran’s nuclear programme, and personal relations between the two leaders are at an all-time low. The EU is also losing patience with Israel’s intransigence over the peace process and the continued building of settlements on occupied land. Last year, various European member states voted to formally recognise a Palestinian state. During his election campaign, Netanyahu also vaguely referred to a conspiracy by foreign governments to remove him from office.

Optimists have pointed out that over the course of his long spell in power, Netanyahu’s record has illustrated his pragmatism above all else. He has abandoned positions taken during campaigns when he is actually governing before; and some will hope that he will do so again. The early signs suggest that this might be the case, to an extent. In a late-night speech claiming victory in the election, he spoke of the need to provide security and social welfare to “all citizens of Israel, Jews and non-Jews alike”. This is already a rewriting of the message he was pushing last week.

Israeli President Reuven Rivlin, who ultimately decides which leader should put together the coalition under the country’s proportional system, has called for a national unity government including both Likud and the Zionist Union. That prospect is unpopular with most Jewish Israeli voters, and seems politically impossible given the lack of common ground between the two. That means Netanyahu must now start the process of forming a coalition – standard practice in a country where no party has ever won an outright majority – which could take weeks. It seems that religious parties will hold the balance, which works well for Netanyahu and his ultra-nationalist agenda.

For Netanyahu’s next government, we can expect to see more of the same belligerence and intransigence. He stood on a platform almost entirely based around the threat from Iran and from Palestine, practically ignoring domestic issues such as the cost of living crisis. Arab Israelis have expressed concern that further discriminatory laws will be passed, while Palestinian politicians have reasserted their plans to seek recourse at the International Criminal Court. If Netanyahu manages to form a government before the beginning of next month, this will be his first crisis: the Palestinians plan to present claims of war crimes to the ICC on 1 April. Seeking this kind of international justice increasingly appears to be the only option for the Palestinian Authority: as Netanyahu has made abundantly clear in the last two months, there is certainly little hope that dialogue will be resumed.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.