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Election Rival Emerges
Israel is set for a general election on Oct. 27, with former military chief Gadi Eisenkot emerging as the principal challenger to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
A Channel 12 poll put Eisenkot’s new party, Yashar (Hebrew for “Straight” or “Upright”), ahead of Netanyahu’s Likud, projecting 23 seats to Likud’s 22 in the 120-member Knesset.
The same survey found that 43 percent of respondents considered Eisenkot, 66, the most suitable candidate for prime minister, compared with 34 percent for Netanyahu.
Eisenkot has built his campaign around a 10-point platform that he says will restore Israel’s security, unity and democratic institutions, and he has pledged to “protect judicial independence, the rule of law, minority rights and a free press.”
The election is widely viewed as a referendum on Netanyahu’s leadership in the violent aftermath of Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel.
Polls, Platform, and Critiques
Eisenkot’s rise is framed as a shift in leadership style, with The Economic Times quoting Tal Elovits saying, “The only signal that he sent was that Israel should be a state of law.”
In the same reporting, Elovits adds that “illegal settlements and settlers' violence will be dealt with,” as Eisenkot’s position on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is described as less clearly defined.
Eisenkot also promises a state commission of inquiry into Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023 cross-border attack, which triggered the Gaza war and led to accusations of an intelligence failure.
The Economic Times says tens of thousands of Israelis have demonstrated in support of such an inquiry, while Netanyahu’s coalition has proposed a commission whose members would be chosen by politicians.
In a social media post cited by The Economic Times, Eisenkot attacked Netanyahu’s coalition, writing, “This is a government that chooses to weaken the army in the midst of a brutal war”.
Security Doctrine and Service
Eisenkot’s campaign centers on a “new long-term national security doctrine” aimed at strengthening the military and reinforcing Israel’s borders, with a central plank of a “universal national service law.”
The Economic Times says the law would extend compulsory service to ultra-Orthodox Jews and Arab citizens, and it ties Eisenkot’s platform to opposition to Netanyahu’s coalition partners advancing legislation exempting many Haredi men from military service.
The Manila Times reports that Eisenkot has dismissed calls for a future Palestinian state as irrelevant after the Oct. 7 attacks and pioneered Israel’s strategy of disproportionate military responses in Lebanon.
A doctrine described in the reporting is the “Dahiya Doctrine,” named after a Beirut suburb that is a Hezbollah stronghold, and it calls for a devastating Israeli response against enemy population centres when Israeli communities come under long-range attack.
Eisenkot’s personal profile is also part of the political narrative, with The Manila Times saying he has attracted widespread public sympathy after his son, Gal, and two nephews were killed fighting in Gaza.
