Back in March, as he turned his back on a ceasefire process that was delivering results, the Israeli prime minister took a decision described by some commentators as akin to “political suicide”.
The Gaza ceasefire deal, brokered by Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff even before the US president was inaugurated to his second term, had led to the release of dozens of hostages from Hamas captivity, in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails.
The next stage was due to see more hostages return home and a gradual withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza, before a negotiated end to the war.
Tired of conflict, Israelis and Palestinians contemplated the end of the most destructive war in a common history too frequently punctuated by fighting.
But Benjamin Netanyahu didn’t want the war to end.
As he ordered the resumption of attacks across Gaza, the prime minister declared that fighting would continue until Hamas had been “completely destroyed”.
The safe return of the remaining hostages in Gaza seemed to be a secondary consideration. (The civilian consequences in Gaza itself didn’t merit a mention.)
Many Israelis, especially the hostage families, were outraged.
They accused Netanyahu of putting his own political survival ahead of their relatives’ safety and the greater good of the nation.
“Bibi’s” popularity in the polls plummeted and he struggled to keep together a disjointed government, propped up by hardline ministers from the far right and orthodox religious parties.
Three months on, Netanyahu is basking in the glory of a spectacular military victory over his nemesis, Iran. He is now said to be contemplating early elections and yet another term as prime minister.
At a press conference earlier this week, the 75-year-old, who is already Israel’s longest-serving leader, said he still had “many missions” to complete and would seek to do so for as long as “the people” of Israel want him to.
Later in the week, and presenting the presumed destruction of Iran’s nuclear programme as a “window of opportunity” that “must not be missed”, Netanyahu suggested only he could secure the “freeing of hostages and defeat of Hamas” after which he would strike wider regional agreements.
But calling early elections would be a big risk and, according to the latest polls, Netanyahu hasn’t enjoyed as big a “bounce” from the 12-day conflict with Iran as he might have hoped for.
‘Trust’
In a fractured political system where coalition building is key in the 120-seat Knesset, Netanyahu’s Likud Party would fall well short of a majority by itself and could struggle to pull together support from smaller parties on the right, suggests latest polling in the Ma’ariv newspaper.
The same polling suggested a significant majority, 59% of Israelis, want the fighting in Gaza to stop now, in exchange for the hostages.
Almost half of those asked, some 49%, also thought the only reason Netanyahu is continuing the war is for his own political considerations.
“The guy is a very skilful political actor,” says Professor Tamar Hermann, a senior Research Fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute. “There is no more skilled politician in Israel.”
But, she says, “trust” is a big problem for Netanyahu.
A political leader who has changed his spots so many times to cling to the reins of power is simply no longer believed by a majority of Israelis.
According to new polling, soon to be released by Prof Hermann’s Israel Democracy Institute, Netanyahu “doesn’t cross the 50% line in terms of Israelis expressing full or even partial trust in him”.
In some ways, says Prof Hermann, deciding to call early elections “is an even greater risk [for Netanyahu] than attacking Iran because in the Middle East you really don’t know where you will be in six months”.
That’s because, despite his military gamble in Iran seemingly paying off, there’s an elephant in the corner of Benjamin Netanyahu’s living room.
Indeed, you could say a small herd of elephants is threatening to disrupt the prime minister’s hopes of yet another term in office.
