Israel After Netanyahu: A Change of Faces or the Continuation of the Project?

Sometimes, parties do not ally because they agree on the future, but because they fear the past. This is almost exactly what is happening today with Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid under the name “Beyachad/Together.” The two men, who were brought together by a short experience in government in 2021, are not returning today with a new political project as much as they are returning with an attempt to reorganize a broad Israeli camp that wants to emerge from Benjamin Netanyahu’s shadow.

According to The Times of Israel, Bennett and Lapid announced that they would run in the next elections as part of a unified list called “Together – Led by Naftali Bennett,” after merging Bennett 2026 with Lapid’s Yesh Atid party, with Bennett heading the new list. Bennett also announced that the door remains open for Gadi Eisenkot, head of the Yashar party, to join this alignment.

What is striking here is that Lapid, who until recently was the most prominent leader of the Israeli opposition, chose to take a step back in favor of Bennett. According to a report published by Ynet, Lapid expressed willingness to move to third place on the list if Eisenkot agrees to join and take second place. This is not merely an organizational detail; it is an indication of the depth of the crisis within the Israeli opposition.

Lapid knows that his image alone is no longer enough to break through the right-wing camp. Bennett also knows that his return alone may not be enough to build a real governing alternative. Therefore, the alliance appears like a cold bargain between the two sides: Lapid gives Bennett an organized party structure and a centrist base, while Bennett gives Lapid an opportunity to address the right wing that does not belong to Netanyahu.

But behind the image of “unity,” contradictions quickly appear. Bennett wants to present himself as a liberal Zionist right-winger, while Lapid represents the secular centrist current. According to The Times of Israel, Bennett stressed when launching the list that he would rely only on Zionist parties to form a government, in a clear message that he does not want to repeat the experience of the 2021 government, which depended on the support of an Arab party.

This is where the real dilemma begins. Arab parties may be, mathematically, the necessary key to removing Netanyahu. But politically, they become the burden that Bennett and Lapid fear. A Channel 12 poll, cited by The Times of Israel, showed that the Bennett–Lapid list could win 26 seats, ahead of Likud, and that the Zionist opposition parties led by Bennett could reach 60 seats, compared with 50 seats for Netanyahu’s bloc, while Arab parties would remain around 10 seats.

The number 60 is very important here. It is close to power, but it is not power. In the Israeli system, it is not enough to come first, and it is not enough to be close to a majority. What is required is 61 seats. For this reason, the Bennett–Lapid alliance may find itself facing the same question: it does not want the Arabs politically, but it may need them mathematically.

Netanyahu understands this point very well, and he will try to use it as an electoral weapon. He realizes that the memory of the 2021 government remains present within the Israeli right, especially because it relied on the support of the United Arab List/Ra’am led by Mansour Abbas. Therefore, he will try to portray the new alliance as a reproduction of the government that previously brought him down, not as a unity government, but as a “fragile” government dependent on those whom the right considers outside the Zionist consensus.

As for Bennett, he is trying to escape this trap through the discourse of a “broad Zionist government.” In a recent interview with The Jerusalem Post, Bennett spoke about his desire to form a broad government that includes dozens of Knesset members from Zionist parties, and he introduced what he called the “Israeli Renaissance” plan, including attracting one million new Jewish immigrants within a decade.

But broad rhetoric does not cancel narrow arithmetic. Israel today is not suffering only from a crisis of leadership, but from a crisis of political meaning. Netanyahu’s camp is no longer as strong as it once was, but it remains cohesive around fear, identity, and security. The opposition camp is no longer as fragmented as it once was, but so far it does not possess a clear narrative beyond the phrase: “not Netanyahu.”

For this reason, the Bennett–Lapid alliance appears closer to an alliance of necessity than an alliance of vision. It is an attempt to convince Israelis that there is an alternative, but it has not yet proven that this alternative is actually different. It may succeed in threatening Netanyahu’s rule, and perhaps even in bringing him down, but it does not necessarily offer a new answer to the questions of occupation, war, the Palestinians, religion and state, and Israel’s place in the region.

In my view, this alliance should not be read as the beginning of Netanyahu’s certain end. More accurately, it is the beginning of a phase in which his survival becomes more difficult. The equation does not yet point to a complete collapse of Netanyahu’s camp, but it does reveal a clear erosion in his ability to monopolize the right and monopolize the image of the “only statesman.”

The most realistic scenario is that the Bennett–Lapid alliance succeeds in becoming the largest bloc, or one of the major blocs, and comes close to the threshold required to form a government. But it will quickly collide with the question of majority. If the Zionist opposition remains around the 60-seat mark, it will need either the joining of a significant figure such as Gadi Eisenkot, a breakthrough within the non-Netanyahu right, or external Arab support that it does not want to acknowledge politically.

Here lies the problem: the alliance may be strong enough to weaken Netanyahu, but it may not be cohesive enough to produce a stable government after him.

Therefore, the more likely scenario is not a smooth transfer of power, but a long battle over legitimacy, blocs, and coalitions. Netanyahu will try to turn the elections into a referendum on the “Arab danger” and the “disguised left-wing government,” while Bennett and Lapid will try to turn them into a referendum on Netanyahu’s failure and the exhaustion of the state. Between these two narratives, Israel may enter a gray zone: Netanyahu is weaker than before and unable to govern with confidence, while the opposition is stronger than before but has not yet proven that it is capable of governing.

This gray zone may be the most dangerous. It does not mean the end of the crisis, but rather its continuation in another form. It may open the door to new bargains, defections, and perhaps additional elections if either side fails to form a stable government.

Regionally, the danger of the Bennett–Lapid alliance does not lie in the possibility that it may change Israel significantly, but in the possibility that it may make Israel appear as if it has changed. The problem is not Netanyahu as a person only, but the political structure that has made expansion a cross-government option, not a whim tied to one leader. Therefore, Netanyahu’s departure, if it happens, may reduce the noise, but it does not guarantee a change in direction.

In simpler words: we may not be facing a less dangerous Israel, but rather an Israel that is smarter in presenting danger. It may move from a loud form of expansion that speaks in the language of Smotrich and Ben-Gvir to a quieter, more institutional form of expansion, and one more capable of being marketed internationally. An expansion that wears a tie instead of a religious banner, and speaks the language of security, administration, and stability instead of the language of explicit annexation.

Here, the danger becomes multiplied. Not because the project has retreated, but because it may become more capable of moving under the ceiling of international legitimacy.

For the region, Netanyahu’s fall should not automatically be read as the beginning of a new peace track. Bennett, in his political essence, is not a departure from the right. Lapid does not represent a deep break with the Israeli security doctrine. We may see an Israel that is less provocative in appearance, but more organized in entrenching facts on the ground: in the West Bank through settlement expansion and security control; in Gaza through re-engineering the political and humanitarian space; and in the region through attempting to restore normalization channels without paying a real political price to the Palestinians.

For this reason, Arab capitals should deal with this alliance with strategic coldness, not media-driven impressions. The question is not: Will Netanyahu leave? The more important question is: Will the logic of expansion leave with him?

If the answer is no, then we may not be facing a new Israel, but rather a quieter version of the same project; a version that knows how to lower its voice, not how to change its course.