Diaspora Jews’ lives would be ‘100% easier’ if Netanyahu loses election

The lives of diaspora Jews will become vastly easier if Benjamin Netanyahu is removed this autumn, and Israel needs a prime minister who is not constantly in the headlines. 

Those were the respective views of Anshel Pfeffer and Jonathan Freedland at an ‘election update’ event hosted by JW3. 

Both journalists made clear they were not neutral on the question of Netanyahu’s future: neither would be “sad to see him go”, as Pfeffer put it, an understatement that set the tone for Tuesday evening’s discussion. 

The strongest contender to topple the prime minister in the elections scheduled for 27 October was Gadi Eisenkot, a former chief of staff of the IDF. 

He differed from previous hopefuls, such as Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid, in that he was not trying to emulate Netanyahu, who has held the top office for almost 19 years and almost the entire period since 2009. The branding of Eisenkot’s party, Yashar, which means straight or upright, pitted him against the “political intrigues and games of a Netanyahu” and “puts him more in line with that tradition of a kind of Rabin”, as Freedland put it. 

Also unlike Netanyahu, who had caved in to the demands of ultra-Orthodox parties by giving them exemption from the army draft, something hugely resented by the secular and non-Haredi population, Eisenkot would expect the ultra-Orthodox to serve in the military, though in exactly what way was unclear. The draft could turn out to be one the big issues in the election. This was, after all, a wartime election (Gaza, southern Lebanon, Iran); and Eisenkot’s son, Gal, 25, was killed in Gaza in December 2023. “Everybody knows that, and that’s huge,” said Pfeffer. 

Pfeffer is author of a 2018 biography titled Bibi. During Tuesday’s online discussion he was particularly critical of the subject of his book for having made himself synonymous with Israel. “I don’t think a prime minister has to be the face of the country.” 

While he had made a large part of his career – currently for Haaretz and the Economist – writing about Netanyahu, he would be very happy not to have to do so. “We’re beginning actually to have the first election where there are issues being talked about – social issues, education,” Pfeffer said. 

After further discussion of Netanyahu’s failings, including his refusal to stop settler violence, something that had flared up in recent weeks, there was further lamentation that Israel had as a result been alienated abroad on both the left and the right. Netanyahu was the reason that Israel is a product you cannot sell abroad.  

In a more hopeful note, Freedland said  that that alienation was not baked in. “It’s 100 percent easier to be a diaspora Jew when Israel is led by a government that you can say is at least trying to make some kind of new arrangement with its neighbours.” If Netanyahu were to lose the election, “the effect will be almost immediate”, he said. “I’m not holding my breath but that’s my impression.” 

Pfeffer ended: “Whether it’s how British Jews feel about Israel and about how the world looks at Israel, and how Israelis finally get around to planning the future of their country, doing so in a Netanyahu-less environment will be so much better.” 

The discussion was solemn but hopeful. It was hoped that the two journalists could be persuaded to return for a “post-mortem” after the elections.