Ehud Barak has won the day, and the Labor Party, or some parts of it, will be joining Bibi Netanyahu’s coalition. Good news for Netanyahu and good news, I believe, for the country. As for the Labor Party - that’s more problematic. But those who suffered the most this week are the many Israeli pundits who vehemently opposed the new Bibi-Barak alliance. Once more the public has learned that newspaper columns do not have the power to change political realities. The outrage of columnists was evident again this morning - as they aired their frustration with Barak’s achievement.
Here’s one example, from Ben Caspit, a leading political columnist that predicted, just yesterday, that Barak would loose the battle: “the Labor Party had signed its death certificate in a ceremony yesterday in Tel Aviv.” Yossi Sarid of Haaretz, a former politician himself, wrote that “This time, ‘national responsibility’ is repeating itself as a farce, but also a tragedy. Never has a social democratic party in Israel been more necessary, and never has Labor been so pathetic and superfluous.”
Shalom Yerushalmi of Maariv wrote that “it was all about personal preferences and about interests. It’s not about what’s better for the country.” Author and columnist Avirama Golan wrote that “Terrified, threatened and yearning for power, the convention delegates yesterday allowed two failed and ousted prime ministers to create a political farce, to push their parties into a corner and to ride roughshod over their constituents in their rush to occupy seats in the government.”
Columnists are crying over Barak’s night of victory, but they all recognize Netanyahu’s achievement. However, the real battle for a stable coalition is still ahead: “Looking at the numbers, Netanyahu is now able to build a coalition of 67 MKs, including six from Labor and none from the National Union, with which Barak has refused to sit. That’s just two more than the supposedly narrow right-wing government of 65 that Netanyahu did everything possible to avoid forming.”
Netanyahu’s mastery of politics in the last half year has been very impressive. He has outsmarted his arch-rival Tzipi Livni three times. First, in Nov. 2008, when he prevented Foreign Minister Livni from forming a coalition as PM Ehud Olmert announced his resignation - forcing new elections; second, In Feb. 2009, when he convinced Avigdor Lieberman to disappoint Livni and shatter her hopes for a Kadima-led coalition supported by Israel Beiteinu; now, in March 2009, when a last minute deal with Barak made the “right-wing narrow” coalition an unusable slogan for Livni. This is a “unity government.”
This doesn’t mean that life will be easy for Netanyahu. For starters, Lieberman is already fuming about the “overpriced” entry of Labor into the government. But he isn’t the only one: within the Likud Party many of the senior members have started to realize that Netanyahu has exchanged major favors with the other members of the coalition. Likud might have won the election, but its members will hardly be able to enjoy it the way victorious parties usually do.
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