November 7, 2024 OPINION BY GREG RAY
The leader of the most extreme right-wing government Israel has ever had is delighted to see his favoured candidate coming back to power. As he fights to stave off corruption charges, to avoid an inquiry into the events leading up to the October 7 Hamas attack, to sidestep calls for an investigation into leaks of sensitive information from his office, to complete his plan to neuter Israel’s high court and to placate his extremist supporters, how can Netanyahu exploit Trump’s victory for further gain?
Benjamin Netanyahu has hailed Donald Trump’s victory in the US presidential election. “Congratulations on history’s greatest comeback,” enthused the controversial leader of the most extreme right-wing government yet to rule Israel.
Hardly surprising.
Despite keeping the taps wide open for funding and weapons to help Israel in its special military operations against its neighbours, previous president Joe Biden got Netanyahu well and truly offside. Among other comments, Biden had called Netanyahu a “fucking liar”, said it was likely he was prolonging the military operations for political reasons and he told Netanyahu that he couldn’t ultimately say no to a Palestinian state.
Things went bad for Biden when he started being critical of Israel’s actions in occupied Gaza. Last May, after many phone calls between the two leaders and their staffs, Biden (apparently reluctantly) publicly threatened to shut off supply of some heavy weapons to Israel if Netanyahu went ahead with his proposed attacks on densely populated Rafah.
In June, the very next month, Biden’s staff rather carelessly agreed to him participating in a non-moderated, non-fact-checked television debate against Donald Trump. Predictably, it didn’t go well for Biden. Suddenly, the US corporate mainstream media and its global subsidiaries appeared to notice that Biden was senile and mentally unsteady. Other people had been saying this for years, with plenty of evidence, but the big media outfits had always cosied in behind him. But the debate was the end for Biden, with the media lampooning him mercilessly and calling for his replacement. The best the Democrats could come up with as a replacement was Kamala Harris, who also mildly pressured Netanyahu to call a ceasefire in Gaza, prompting a prickly response from the Israeli PM.
In July, the very next month, Netanyahu requested a face-to-face meeting with Trump, and it was clear that Trump was his preferred president. This came after an extraordinary address to the US Congress by Netanyahu, during which he was accorded standing ovations and was treated with fawning obsequiousness by most of the US lawmakers. This highlights the great influence that the so-called “Israel lobby” has on US politics. It is no secret that a lack of support for Israel can spell the end of a political career, while the rewards for supporting Israel may appear to be proportionate to the level of that support.
Why is Netanyahu so keen on Trump, when he was getting almost everything he wanted from the Democrats anyway? Well, during his first term Trump had shown himself to be extremely obliging to the aspirations of Israel’s far-right. He shifted the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and recognised Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights. He claimed to be the most pro-Israel president ever, while Netanyahu called Trump the greatest friend Israel had ever had. Trump sent his proudly Zionist son-in-law, Jared Kushner, to be his special envoy in the Middle East. As an aside, Kushner seems likely to be influential again.
Admittedly, Trump and Netanyahu have had some ups and downs in their relationship over the years, but both men are opportunists. To underscore that point, Netanyahu took advantage of the cover of the US election to sack his latest defence minister, Yoav Gallant, leading to angry protest demonstrations by thousands of citizens on the streets of Israeli cities. Gallant is the fourth defence minister to be sacked or to resign after disagreeing with Netanyahu. The sacking was yet another devious move by a national leader that more and more Israelis are finally coming to recognise as an extremely dangerous rogue. Among other things, the sacking is meant to preserve the right of Israel’s ultra-orthodox Jews to avoid military service and to short-circuit investigations into the so-called “Bibi-leaks” scandal that threatens Netanyahu’s own job security.
What happens next? In the Middle East the possibilities are even more horrifying than what has already been happening with the complicity of the US and other western governments. Netanyahu sees a bigger regional war as the answer to his prayers: a conflict so all-consuming that his misdeeds can be buried by the demands of the crisis and from which he can emerge with the prize of the enlarged and enriched “Greater Israel” that his extremist supporters crave and demand.
With Iran promising a major attack on Israeli targets by way of retaliation against Israel, the pretext for an expansion of hostilities could come at any moment.
Will Trump be foolish enough to give Netanyahu what he wants? Here’s what the editor-in-chief of the English-language edition of Israeli media outfit Haaretz, Esther Solomon, has to say on that subject:
Israel is ruled by a more-than-simply-aspiring autocrat and annexationist touting “total victory” while America will soon be governed by a similarly authoritarian and exclusionist MAGA demagogue. How these two disastrous leaders’ worldviews and policies will coalesce or conflict will have a fateful impact on Israel, the Palestinians and the wider Middle East – from the wars devastating the region to the nature of the societies that will emerge in their wake.
