Is removing Netanyahu enough to change Israel?

The question is not an attempt to predict the outcome of Israel’s upcoming election on October 27, nor is it a wager on whether Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will fall or survive. Israel’s political landscape today is far too fractured, anxious, and ideologically rigid to be reduced to a single name — even if that name has become the gravitational center of the country’s crisis.

The real question is more unsettling: Does Israel possess the ability to change from within, even if Netanyahu stays? And would Israel truly change if he goes? This is not a search for a comforting answer, but an inquiry into what lies after the election — a reading of the deeper structures that shape Israel’s relationship with itself, with the Palestinians, and with the world.

To understand the magnitude of this moment, it is useful to revisit what Israeli sociologist Yuval Noah Harari has been writing lately. He distills the roots of the conflict into a stark, almost disarming sentence: “What fuels the Israeli–Palestinian conflict is not a shortage of land or resources, but false moral certainties born of overly simplified historical narratives.” At its core, many Israelis and Palestinians believe they hold absolute moral truth — and that the other side holds absolute moral wrong — and therefore the other side has no legitimate right to exist. This conviction makes internal change in Israel far more complex than simply replacing one prime minister with another.

The upcoming election carries exceptional weight because it is the first since the events of October 7, 2023 — a day that exposed the fragility of Israel’s security doctrine and reopened the question of whether Israel can ever be a genuine partner for peace. Israeli leaders, led by Netanyahu, have failed to demonstrate such readiness. They offered Palestinians occupation, settlement expansion, displacement, and perpetual conflict — instead of a credible political horizon.

But the deeper question remains: Is the problem Netanyahu alone? Or is it an entire political architecture that treats force as a substitute for a solution?

There is also the matter of Israeli society itself — a society living under the weight of existential debris, convinced that normal life is impossible, and led by politicians who have failed to rise above religious animosity and cycles of brutal war.

This sense of collapse is echoed by prominent Israeli writers. David Grossman, winner of the 2017 Man Booker International Prize, wrote recently that “Israel is living a nightmare,” asking: “Who will we be when we rise from the ashes?” He argues that Israel is now paying the tangible price of years of seduction by corrupt leadership that dragged the country from bad to worse. Grossman doubts Israel’s ability to shed its outdated paradigms, insisting that what happened in Gaza is so immense and horrific that it cannot be understood through old models.

The peace process itself requires a fundamental reset. Palestinians should not be asked to accept another transitional framework resembling Oslo — endless phases, committees, and negotiations that lead nowhere. The goal must be clear from the outset: a sovereign, viable Palestinian state alongside Israel.

Israeli peace activist Gershon Baskin, a long‑time advocate of the two‑state solution, argues that if a new Palestinian political force emerges with strong public backing — committed to nonviolence, democracy, mutual recognition, and a clear two‑state program — it would resonate deeply inside Israel. It would undermine the right‑wing claim that “Israel has no partner.” And it would force Israel’s opposition leaders to confront a direct question: If Palestinians demonstrate genuine readiness for peace, are you prepared to be genuine partners as well?

Recent polling reveals a striking dynamic: The opposition is ahead of Netanyahu’s bloc, yet neither side can reach the 61 seats needed to form a government. The map shifts daily. Arab parties hold a delicate balance. And the opposition, as sociologist Yehouda Shenhav‑Shahrabani notes, is “more an anti‑Netanyahu bloc than a coherent political alternative.”

Shenhav‑Shahrabani puts it bluntly: “A large number of Israelis want to get rid of Netanyahu… not only because of corruption, but because he is at the center of the country’s problems.” Even within Likud, some voters are now hesitant to support him.

But this leads to the central dilemma: Is removing Netanyahu enough to change Israel? Or will Israel simply reproduce another Netanyahu — with a new face and a new tone, but the same political structure that rejects a real solution?

Polls also show widespread fear of a future war with Iran, and deep division over whether “internal betrayal” played a role in the events of October 7. It is a society living on the edge of anxiety, on the edge of competing narratives, and on the edge of a future it cannot clearly imagine.

In the end, the question remains suspended: Can Israel change without Netanyahu? His departure is unlikely to be sufficient. His survival is unlikely to be decisive. Real change will not come from the name of the prime minister, but from Israel’s ability to break its false moral certainties and recognize that peace is not a concession — it is a condition for survival.

Until that happens, the question will linger between two possibilities: An Israel determined to remain as it is, and an Israel afraid of remaining as it is.

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