It seems like an eternity instead of only a month since Yair Lapid received the mandate from President Reuven Rivlin to form a coalition after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu failed to do so.
(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)
It seems like an eternity instead of only a month since Yair Lapid received the mandate from President Reuven Rivlin to form a coalition after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu failed to do so.
The country is no longer the same as it was on May 5, when Rivlin handed the mandate to the Yesh Atid leader, noting that he had secured the recommendations of 56 MKs, versus seven for Yamina leader Naftali Bennett.
Since then, the country experienced a traumatic 11-day war with Hamas that saw some 4,500 rockets launched from Gaza, with direct hits on major population centers that resulted in fatalities and injuries, both physical and emotional.
The 11th-hour announcement Wednesday night of the formation of the much-vaunted “change” government brokered by Lapid, which will see Bennett become Israel’s first prime minister with only seven mandates, is the first tentative step at restoring a sense of equilibrium to a nation lost at sea.
The specter of a fifth election was something that no rational Israeli looked forward to. Yet, as the struggles at birthing this makeshift coalition demonstrated, there was a distinct possibility we could have ended up there.
And there remains a distinct possibility that we’ll end up back at the polls long before the lifespan of the government expires. As difficult as it was to cajole parties – from Yamina and Ra’am (United Arab List) to Yisrael Beytenu and Meretz – with such disparate ideologies and philosophies to agree to sit together, the hard part is just beginning.
Although their only common bond may have been to finally see Netanyahu leave Balfour Street after the longest run as prime minister in Israel’s history, that’s not going to be a sufficient reason for the government to stay together.
This coalition has a chance to really change Israel for the better, without the quote marks. Representing Right, Left, religious, secular, Jewish and Arab, the newborn government has the potential to repair the distrust and animosity, heal the fractures between the various communities and steer us toward a less bumpy and more stable path.
However, to achieve that goal, the parties making up the coalition need to temporarily pack up their ambitions and ideologies and store them outside the door.
As witnessed by the bickering and down-to-the-wire negotiations that marked the past week, that’s not going to be easy. And it may prove to be impossible. But if the members of the coalition remember who they are supposed to be working for and focus on the issues and the basic tenets that bind us as Israelis – the right to live with dignity, security and mutual respect – then there’s hope they will succeed.
Instead of tackling the big issues, the focus should be on getting the country running again. After years of divisiveness, seeing a governing body that can work together for the good of the country will not only bring us back to the ideals that Israel was founded on, it will provide a role model for how the rest of us can behave in our interactions with each other.
It’s a long shot. But after two years of political turmoil, over a year under a deadly pandemic and 11 days of war, we could all stand a little sanity. Let’s hope this coalition can provide it.
As reported by The Jerusalem Post