Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, failed to pass the new budget law by the legally binding deadline of midnight on Tuesday and consequently it broke up: in Israel, voting will then return on March 23, for the fourth time in two years. The current government, formed by a coalition between Likud – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s party – and Blue and White – Defense Minister Benny Gantz’s centrist party – will remain in office for current affairs until the elections.
The government of Netanyahu and Gantz was born in May after yet another election from which a clear majority had not emerged: Netanyahu had managed to convince Gantz – his opponent since his entry into politics, about two years ago – by explaining that the country had needing a stable government to deal with the pandemic, and promising that in November 2021 he would step aside to step down as prime minister to Gantz. However, relations between Gantz and Netanyahu had deteriorated very rapidly and for several weeks there had been talk of a probable government crisis.
Likud and Blue and White were in talks to find an agreement on the budget law and try to avoid new elections. An attempt to pass a law that would have extended the deadline for approving the budget law until next week (giving more time to reach an agreement) had failed on Monday and the latest negotiations between Gantz and Netanyahu had also been useless today.
At the moment, despite the mismanagement of the coronavirus epidemic, Netanyahu is still going strong in the polls, while Gantz’s popularity has plummeted after the decision to join the coalition government (which also resulted in a split between Blue and White). In the last weeks instead, it has grown a lot in the polls Yamina, a far-right party led by former Defense Minister Naftali Bennett, who is given a stone’s throw from Likud in polls. The elections next March will be the fourth in two years, after those of April and September 2019 and March 2020, which had not given any party or coalition a clear majority.
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