Why most Israelis want Netanyahu to go

An explanation for Americans and Europeans who are wondering why Israelis are back to the streets

A friend from Seattle asked me the other day why Israelis have restarted their protests against the current prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. All he’s been hearing among his circles in the liberal northwest of the United States is that Israel, under Netanyahu’s leadership, was able to snatch victory out of the jaws of October 7, 2023. “Can you please explain to me what you have against the guy?” he asked. As others have asked me, “The Iranians are cut down to size, the economy is doing better than anyone expected, and all he wants is to align Israel’s judiciary with how we do things in the US. What’s the big deal?”

It made me realize that the more than two-thirds of Israelis who have consistently answered in polls that they want Netanyahu out of office, out of public life, and as soon as possible, may have not done a good job of communicating why. This article is an attempt to provide an overview of the current case against Netanyahu and his government, and why all who support Israel and pray for its permanence should join in the call to have Netanyahu resign, immediately.

First, let’s give Netanyahu credit: it is true, as the longest-serving prime minister of the State of Israel, Netanyahu shaped Israel in many ways that many Israelis appreciate. Netanyahu strengthened the economy, building infrastructure for unleashing Israeli ingenuity in the technology sector. Netanyahu expanded Israel’s integration with the global economy and put it on the map as a power broker. Netanyahu expanded Israel’s circle of peace with the Abraham Accords and opened Israel to potential normalization with Saudi Arabia and the Sunni world.

Because of these achievements, Netanyahu believed he could minimize the conflict with the Palestinians by enacting a divide and conquer strategy against the Palestinians: he isolated the Palestinian Authority in Judea and Samaria, and then actively worked to build up Gaza as a counterweight by transferring billions of dollars to Hamas – an act most Israelis implicitly supported. All of which is why he kept winning popular support, election after election.

When Netanyahu was elected once more in 2022 and formed the current government, 49% of Israelis voted either for him or for the parties who pledged themselves to form a government under him. Due to electoral math, this provided him with the broadest and most religiously maniacal coalition he’s had in decades. The Netanyahu most Israelis thought of as generally moderate, generally cautious, generally liberal literally changed overnight.

Instead of advancing a bill of rights that would protect individual freedoms (Israel has no bill of rights, no constitution), Netanyahu chose to back an ill-conceived bill by Yariv Levin to enable the currently-elected government to capture Israel’s judicial system by placing full power of appointment in its hands. Instead of working towards expanding the circle of service in the military and in the economy, Netanyahu worked to allocate billions in taxpayer shekels to institutions controlled by his religious maniacal partners of the Haredi community and prevent a universal draft. Instead of strengthening the technology sector which had seen a significant downtick in new company formation in recent years, Netanyahu gave his zealot partners in the Settler Movement free hand to start fires across Judea and Samaria, fueling an increasingly accepted boycott movement against Israeli universities and companies abroad.

And then came October 7, 2023, when the same movement he funded in Gaza as a means of hedging against the Palestinian Authority committed unspeakable acts and threw Israel into a hell we have yet to climb out of. Israelis witnessed the same Israel Defense Forces that Netanyahu’s successive administrations bragged about crumble in defense, taking hours if not days to reach the front lines within the very borders of our country. Israelis witnessed the same civil service Netanyahu gutted and hollowed out in a decades long campaign to privatize social services fall apart, requiring civil society to come together to care for those hurt, those wounded, our internal refugees. Israelis witnessed the same Northern region Netanyahu bragged about turning into the jewel of Israel evacuated, as he rejected calls by his then-minister of defense and military chief of staff to take the fight to the enemy on October 11, 2023, what he then was forced into doing when the beeper operation was discovered.

Israelis witnessed Iran fire rockets at Israel with impunity, with Netanyahu’s government responding with largely threatening but not punishing responses. Israelis witnessed their sons and brothers and cousins serve in the reserves for 200, 300, 350 days – up from the 30 that was previously expected – while Netanyahu’s government made promises to exempt the fastest growing demographic in Israel, the maniacal orthodox, from service. Israelis witnessed their social services cut as budgets flowed into new municipal positions for rabbis in places they are unneeded, they witnessed a flight blockade on Israel while their transportation minister was gallivanting around the world, and saw the entire defense establishment take responsibility for their mistakes on a single night while the person who funded Hamas and granted them political legitimacy – Netanyahu himself – fights mightily against a national commission of inquiry that any other government would have set up on October 8, 2023.

And there are more reasons: the attempt to fire the head of Israel’s national security service, Ronen Bar, while he investigates a Qatari infiltration into Netanyahu’s own inner circle; the shameless behavior of the Netanyahu family in Miami as Israelis suffer under the burden of war; the lack of empathy for the hostages and their families. The lack of strategy, lack of care for social unity. Lack of responsibility or accountability. For these and more 70% of Israelis and counting want Netanyahu gone from their lives. We want to start over.

In 2022, after he was elected for this current tragic candidacy, Netanyahu was asked by Bari Weiss who his biblical hero is. “King Saul,” he said. The story of Saul is apt for our time: a king who was supposed to end Amalek, but didn’t. A king who was supposed to unite Israel, but led to civil war. A king who went mad in his old age and nearly took down the Jewish People with him. Let us hope we have more fortune than the Israelis of Saul’s time to avoid a civil war. To do that, we need the help of all who love Israel to chase Netanyahu from power once and for all.