Episode description

In last Tuesday’s Knesset elections, the Israeli electorate delivered a big win to Benjamin Netanyahu and his right-wing coalition in the fifth Israeli election since 2019. The right-wing bloc won 64 Knesset seats, which will likely give Netanayhu and allied parties enough votes to form a stable and ideologically coherent coalition government. Netanyahu’s probable return to power is thanks to the strength of the Religious Zionism coalition, consisting of three of the most extreme parties in Israeli politics. The coalition won 14 seats, the most it has ever gotten. 

Jewish Currents senior reporter Alex Kane spoke to editor-at-large Peter Beinart, contributing editor Joshua Leifer, and contributing writer Elisheva Goldberg about the rise of the Religious Zionism coalition, the commonalities between that coalition and the Israeli center-left, and how these elections might affect the US-Israel relationship. 

Articles Mentioned:

“Kahanism’s Raucous Return,” Joshua Leifer, Jewish Currents

“Israel’s Ascendant Far Right Can’t Be Understood by Analogy,” Peter Beinart, Jewish Currents

“U.S. unlikely to work with Jewish supremacist expected to be made Israeli minister,” Barak Ravid, Axios

Thanks to Jesse Brenneman for producing and to Nathan Salsburg for the use of his song “VIII (All That Were Calculated Have Passed).”