Late Wednesday evening, May 6, before the clock struck midnight Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu needed to finalize a coalition of parties willing to endorse him in order to secure his fourth term as Israel’s PM. Two hours before his deadline he cinched a deal with the extreme-right pro-settler group HaBayit HaYehudi headed by Naftali Bennett. Even with the deal, Netanyahu now hangs by a thread. His coalition includes a scant 61 out of 120 parliament members, down from the 67 votes he thought were in his pocket. The government will convene with a cabinet full of Netanyahu’s political rivals and a weak coalition—one of the weakest in Israel’s history. If Netanyahu cannot appease every member of his ruling government, he will need to seek support from his opposition led by the Zionist Camp’s Yitzhak Herzog in order to survive. Herzog came in second in the March 17 elections winning 24 seats to Netanyahu’s 30.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the leader of the extreme-right pro-settler party HaBayit HaYehudi, Naftali Bennett, last Wednesday, May 6, after their coalition agreement (Photo: Likud)

Netanyahu’s coalition-building process was thrown into disarray Monday when Netanyahu’s chief political ally, racist Avigdor Lieberman announced that his party and their 6 Knesset votes were out the door. The two split over social benefits that Lieberman wanted for his secular-nationalist constituents, but Netanyahu gave them instead to religious right-wing groups.

The deal Netanyahu cut with Bennett means the Likud party is headed even further to the right. The full contents of the agreement will be revealed by next week when the new cabinet members are announced and sworn in. Already Israeli correspondents are reporting on the horse trading that took place for Bennett to joint Netanyahu’s coalition; Haaretz wrote:

“The education budget will be raised by 630 million shekels (163.4 million dollars), 1 billion shekels (250 million dollars) will be allocated for increasing the salaries of soldiers during their third year [of army service], and the budget of Ariel University [in the West Bank] will be augmented. In addition, the NGO bill [which would limit foreign funding of Israeli human rights organizations] will likely be passed; a focus will be made on improving accessibility for disabled in educational institutions; on security measures for transportation in the West Bank; and on strengthening outlying settlements.”

Netanyahu and the Likud have not made any statements on the coalition or the deal with Bennett other than a few ceremonial words presented to President Reuven Rivlin.

Head of the Joint List, MK Ayman Odeh (Hadash), told the press: “The Netanyahu-Bennett coalition is a social disaster and danger for democracy. This coalition is burying any hope for a peace agreement and solving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.” He said the new government would cause deep rifts between Arab and Jewish citizens of Israel, promoting “racist laws which will harm the Arab citizens of the country the most.”