This Saturday in synagogues worldwide, Jews will recount the Biblical story of Abraham’s negotiations with the elders of Hebron to buy a burial place for his wife Sarah.
But the horse-trading in the backrooms of Israeli politics will make Honest Abe look like a guy buying retail in a suburban shopping mall.
They say 10 Jews, 20 opinions, and you can multiply those figures by a million when Israeli politicians try to cobble together a new government.
Here’s the outcome: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu steps down. Gadi Eisenkot, former Israeli militia general and chief of staff, leader of the Yashar Party, and the father of a son slain in the Gaza war, will be the next prime minister.
So how’s that going to happen?
In Israel, you don’t vote directly for prime minister. You vote for a party. The parties form into blocs. The prime minister role goes to the leader of the bloc that commands a majority in the incoming Knesset, or Parliament. With me so far?
Now it gets complicated.
Israel has a ton of political parties which somehow break down into six groups. First, you’ve got pro-Israel Arab parties. Yes, they exist, and they serve in the Knesset, same as do Jews. Tough to claim Israel’s an apartheid state when Arabs serve in the government, but the Left never lets facts get in the way of their antisemitism. Problem is, their leader won’t label Hamas a terrorist group. Oops.
Next, you’ve a bloc of anti-Israel Arab parties that also serve in the Knesset. Yes, they do. You can’t make this stuff up.
Then you’ve got left-wing Israeli parties, but they fared poorly in this post-Oct. 7 environment.
Then you’ve got two right-wing, security-minded blocs. One is led by Bibi Netanyahu, prime minister since the time of the aforesaid Abraham. OK, slight exaggeration, but after 20 years, it feels that way.
The other is led by Gadi Eisenkot.
And finally, you’ve got the religious parties, often kingmakers in Israeli elections because whoever’s trying to build a coalition needs (and pays dearly for) their votes.
Still with me?
Neither Bibi’s bloc nor Eisenkot’s crew got enough Knesset votes to claim victory. So each will try to pull together a coalition, through the aforesaid backroom deal-cutting.
The religious parties demand that their sons be exempted from military service. In a post-Oct. 7 environment, that position is poison to the rest of Israel. So that’s a nonstarter. (Or should be.)
And you’d rather not bring the Arabs into leadership since they support, or at least won’t denounce, Hamas.
Now what?
In Getting To Yes, their classic book on negotiation, Roger Fisher and William Ury urge “going to the balcony” –- getting perspective not just on positions but on the interests that drive those positions.
So if we go to the balcony in Israel, we see Netanyahu, 77, whose lifelong ambition is to dismantle the Iranian theocracy, which since its inception has been killing Jews and other Westerners and sponsoring terrorism worldwide.
Bibi will go to Gadi and say, “I’ll step down and throw you my votes as long as you stay committed to wiping out Iran.”
And Gadi will say to Bibi, put ‘er there, pal. Done deal.
When the dust settles, all of this will explain why Gadi Eisenkot is your new Israeli prime minister.
This will also test whether the rest of the world’s I-Hate-Bibi Club is legitimate — that they don’t like Netanyahu or they really don’t like any Israeli leader.
AMERICA IS HOLDING AN ELECTION. IT NEEDS A DIVORCE
I told you it was complicated. But the solution is simple. Bibi out, Gadi in, Iran goes down.
And you heard it here first!
Michael Levin is a two-time New York Times bestselling author. His next novel, 2028, A Political Thriller, will be published by Morgan James in April.