In a Haaretz column, analyst Chaim Levinson describes a prime minister trapped on all fronts with no exit strategy, relying on incitement against the judiciary, Arab citizens, and legal advisers ahead of what he warns will be Israel's most brutal election campaign.
Chaim Levinson, veteran Haaretz columnist, published a sharply critical assessment of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's political and strategic position on Thursday, arguing that the premier is boxed in on every front — diplomatic, military, and domestic — and has no plan beyond incitement.
The column draws on an unnamed source close to the Trump administration who allegedly expressed deep personal antipathy toward Netanyahu, speculating that if Trump fails to win re-election, Netanyahu will not be invited back to Washington. Levinson writes that Secretary of State Marco Rubio is skipping Israel on his upcoming Middle East trip, which he frames as evidence that Israel is being treated as a nuisance by Washington amid the Iran deal crisis.
On the Lebanon front, Levinson claims Israel's military position has deteriorated: thousands of soldiers are stuck in southern Lebanon, the Air Force no longer strikes Beirut (citing the Iran memorandum as the diplomatic constraint), and Hezbollah drone activity has regained an advantage. He characterizes the February 27 operation as a Netanyahu-Katz adventure that left Israel worse off than before.
The column also warns of a domestic crisis with the Haredi community, noting that no real draft law has been proposed, and that the proposed 'arrest cancellation law' does not solve the military manpower problem. Levinson predicts the upcoming elections will be 'the ugliest and most violent in the country's history,' with Netanyahu left only to incite against Arabs, the High Court, and the Attorney General.
As The Zioneer has previously reported (BACKGROUND), the tension between Netanyahu and the Trump administration over Lebanon and Iran has been increasing for weeks, with multiple reports of U.S. pressure for an IDF withdrawal. The column presents the harshest public articulation yet of the view that Israel's position has fundamentally weakened across all fronts.
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