If You Love Israel, Mr. Netanyahu, Let Her Go

I come from a family that voted Likud and Shas. That’s what I grew up with. Those were the parties my family believed in, and those were the political values that shaped much of the conversation around our family table.

So when I say that Benjamin Netanyahu needs to go, I want people to understand something. I’m not saying this as someone who has spent his entire life opposing the Israeli right. Quite the opposite.

I grew up with an enormous amount of respect for the Likud of Menachem Begin and the principles of Ze’ev Jabotinsky. I understood what that movement represented to so many Israelis, particularly families like mine.

But the Likud of today is not the Likud of Begin and Jabotinsky. And somewhere along the way, we’ve allowed an entire political movement to become synonymous with one man.

Benjamin Netanyahu is not the Likud. And the Likud is certainly not Benjamin Netanyahu.

I think that’s something we’ve forgotten.

For years, Netanyahu has positioned himself as the only person capable of leading Israel, the only person who can keep us safe, the only person who understands the threats we face.

And for years, millions of Israelis believed him.

But then October 7 happened.

I don’t think any of us will ever fully recover from that day. I know I won’t.

And while there are many people, institutions and failures that need to be investigated, there’s one thing I simply cannot understand.

How does a man who spent so many years telling us that only he could guarantee our security suddenly have so little responsibility when that security catastrophically failed?

You cannot claim ownership of every success and then wash your hands of the failures.

That’s not how leadership works.

And frankly, I’m tired of watching people twist themselves into knots trying to explain why it somehow should.

October 7 happened on Netanyahu’s watch. That doesn’t mean he alone is responsible for everything that happened. Of course he isn’t. But he was the prime minister, and with that office comes responsibility.

It’s really that simple.

And yet, instead of accountability, we’ve spent years watching political manoeuvring, finger pointing and an increasingly divided country.

At what point do we finally say enough?

I keep thinking about Menachem Begin.

Begin was a complicated man, as most great political figures are. He made decisions people agreed with and decisions people vehemently opposed. But one thing I have always respected about him is that he understood there was a country beyond his own political career.

In 1983, Begin resigned.

He didn’t take Likud down with him. He didn’t insist that the country would collapse without him. He didn’t spend his final days in office trying to convince Israelis that he was somehow indispensable.

He simply recognized that his time had come.

And he left.

Likud survived. Israel survived. Democracy survived.

Imagine that.

Which brings me to something I’ve been saying for quite some time now.

Why exactly can’t Likud be part of Israel’s next government without Netanyahu?

Seriously. Why not?

There are capable people within Likud. There are people who believe in the party’s original principles, people who could work with other political parties to form a government that actually begins the process of healing this country.

A government that could focus on rebuilding trust, restoring confidence in our institutions and addressing the enormous challenges Israel faces.

But instead, we’re expected to believe that the political survival of one man is somehow inseparable from the survival of the State of Israel.

It’s absurd.

And I think deep down, even some of Netanyahu’s most loyal supporters know it.

I want to make something very clear. This isn’t about left versus right.

I’m not suggesting that everyone suddenly needs to become a centrist or abandon their political beliefs. I certainly haven’t abandoned mine.

I believe in a strong Israel. I believe in our right to defend ourselves. I believe in the importance of Jewish self-determination and the extraordinary responsibility we have to protect the one Jewish state in the world.

But none of those beliefs requires Benjamin Netanyahu to remain prime minister.

Not one.

And if anything, I would argue that putting the country before any individual politician is one of the most patriotic things an Israeli can do.

I recently travelled back to Israel to vote because I felt this election was simply too important to sit out.

It wasn’t convenient. It meant flights, time away from work and family, and a fair amount of logistical juggling.

But I went because this is my country, and I believe that when you have the privilege of participating in its democracy, you should.

Standing there and casting my ballot, I wasn’t thinking about political revenge or settling scores.

I was thinking about the Israel I want to see moving forward.

An Israel where we can disagree without treating one another as enemies.

An Israel where the families of October 7 finally receive the answers they deserve.

An Israel where a genuine, independent state commission of inquiry can investigate what happened, without political interference or predetermined conclusions.

Because those families deserve the truth. All of it.

And frankly, so do the rest of us.

I think about our soldiers and reservists, many of whom have spent extraordinary amounts of time away from their families, businesses and everyday lives.

I think about the families who have buried their children.

I think about the Israelis who wake up every morning wondering what kind of future we’re leaving the next generation.

And then I look at our political leadership, and I wonder how much longer we’re expected to tolerate this.

Israel is exhausted.

Not defeated. Not broken. But exhausted.

And there is a difference.

We are an extraordinary country. Anyone who knows me knows how deeply I believe that.

I’ve spent much of my adult life defending Israel, first in uniform and later through my work, my public advocacy and the conversations I have with people around the world.

I’ve seen what Israelis are capable of when we come together. I’ve seen our generosity, our resilience, our creativity and that uniquely Israeli ability to argue passionately with someone one minute and invite them over for dinner the next.

It’s one of the things I love most about us.

We are Jews and Arabs, Druze and Bedouins, secular and religious, people whose families have been here for generations and people who arrived yesterday.

We are loud, opinionated, sometimes impossible, and wonderfully complicated.

And somehow, through all of that, we’ve built something extraordinary.

That is the Israel I love.

And that is the Israel I want us to get back to.

I don’t want Likud destroyed. I don’t want the Israeli right erased. I want a healthy democracy where political parties represent ideas and where leaders understand that their responsibility is to the people, not to their own political survival.

Because here’s the thing about democracy.

No one owns the country.

Not the prime minister. Not the opposition. Not the religious parties. Not the secular parties.

The country belongs to its citizens. All of them.

And their votes matter equally, whether we happen to like how they vote or not.

That’s not a radical idea. That’s democracy.

Mr. Netanyahu, you’ve served as Israel’s prime minister longer than anyone in our history.

You’ve had an extraordinary political career. There are achievements that even your fiercest critics should be able to acknowledge, just as there are failures that your most devoted supporters should be willing to confront.

History will decide how to remember you.

And I suspect that debate will continue long after we’re all gone.

But there is still one decision that belongs entirely to you.

How you leave.

You can continue fighting to hold on to power, deepening the divisions in a country that desperately needs to heal.

Or you can recognize that perhaps the greatest contribution you can make to Israel now is to step aside.

Allow Likud to find its next generation of leadership. Allow a new government to form. Allow the country to begin moving forward.

You don’t have to agree with the people who will replace you. You don’t have to abandon your beliefs or apologize for having held them.

You simply have to recognize that Israel is bigger than you.

Because it is.

It always has been.

I have no doubt that you love Israel, Mr. Netanyahu. I genuinely don’t.

But love isn’t about holding on to something so tightly that you refuse to let it grow beyond you.

Sometimes love means knowing when your part in the story has come to an end.

And sometimes the most meaningful thing you can do for something you love is give it the freedom to move forward without you.

Israel was here before Benjamin Netanyahu.

And Israel will be here long after Benjamin Netanyahu.

The question is what kind of country we leave behind.

So Mr. Netanyahu, if you truly love Israel, let her go.

Let her heal. Let her grow. Let her find her way forward.

Because Israel belongs to all of us.

And we owe each other at least that much.