Who is Naftali Bennett?

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1. THis is a brilliant Defense of Bibi Netanyahu’s term of office as Prime Minister of Israel, By Fiamma Nirenstein, the Italian-Israeli politician and journalist.. Published in the Algemeiner.

   Friends, Israelis, Countrymen, Lend Me Your Ears

   Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks at a ceremony for fallen soldiers of Israel’s wars at the Yad Lebanim House on the eve of Memorial Day, in Jerusalem, April 13, 2021. Debbie Hill/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo
   JNS.org – “The noble Brutus hath told you Caesar was ambitious,” eulogizes Mark Antony in The Tragedy of Julius Caesar. He then goes on to sing the praises of the dead leader whose body lay on the pavement of Rome, arousing the crowd’s love.

   History has spoken of Caesar, the protagonist of Roman history, as he deserved. This will also be the case in relation to outgoing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who, fortunately, is in very good health and may one day return as the country’s premier.

   Today, however, the new “noble” men and women of Israel’s next government not only say that their coalition is going to save the nation from him, but that they have accomplished an essential historical achievement. They list a number of reasons for these claims — which, by the way, far outweigh the unclear strategy of their eight-party governing coalition.

   For one thing, they say, no matter how valuable a leader may be in a democracy, a 12-year term in power is an anomaly that (beyond arousing envy) has led to the undermining of democracy itself. They insist that this has been Netanyahu’s intent.

   For another, as they often repeat: Caesar, or rather Netanyahu, has a difficult personality. They depict him as a cutthroat, power-hungry politician who leaves no room for others. This is the main reason for the government sworn in today: its partners — from Yamina’s Naftali Bennett to Yesh Atid’s Yair Lapid, as well as from Yisrael Beiteinu’s Avigdor Lieberman to New Hope’s Gideon Sa’ar — all say that they have signed on to this unity government because they have been treated unjustly and with arrogance by Netanyahu.

   The late British Prime Minister Winston Churchill also had a problematic character. This did not prevent him, however, from saving Europe from Adolf Hitler. Similar words can and were said about Caesar, as well.

   Nor has Netanyahu’s family been spared the wrath of his detractors, with his wife Sara’s personality, and his son Yair’s social-media posts part and parcel of the intolerance towards him. This is despite the fact that they have never been known to influence his clear, elaborate, Zionist strategy.

   And, of course, the adjective “corrupt” is hurled at him ad abundantiam, due to his trial on charges of breach of trust, bribery and fraud. This is in spite of the fact that many jurists consider the indictments to be false and spurious—particularly those involving his ostensibly having bribed a news outlet to obtain positive press coverage, which he never received, and that he received ridiculous gifts of cigars and champagne from powerful businessmen in exchange for favors.

   Netanyahu however, whose leadership is now interrupted and who’s future is uncertain, is a man at the center of major turning points in Israel’s recent history, the latest of which was the country’s victory in fighting COVID-19. His determined vaccination campaign is a testimony to his leadership. His efforts to secure a vaccine deal with Pfizer early on was for him synonymous with saving Israel, which explains not only why he “obsessively” sought it out, but also did it better than any other world leader.

   This is an integral part of his drive: his perception, refined over time, that Israel is a small country with strong enemies and insecure borders that must be protected. It’s the only country that holds firm to the principles of Western values, while preserving Jewish tradition and history.

   It thus requires a leader with the utmost dedication and determination, who doesn’t joke around and understands that when it comes security, no compromise is possible.

   The first time that Netanyahu became prime minister in 1996 after defeating Shimon Peres, his determination seemed hard and solemn. Over time, he adapted his behavior, but solidified the content of his vision for the country, which he outlined during a trip to Argentina: Israel must be able to defend itself; its science and technology should be unrivaled; it needs to have the most modern weapons and the best intelligence. To accomplish this, it needs a lot of money, a free economy (with far less red tape), open markets, and great foreign relations.

   Here he identified his path to what has been the greatest ambition of every Israeli prime minister, from Menachem Begin to Yitzhak Rabin, from the political right to the left: peace. He understands that peace with the Palestinians deserves serious effort, which is why he has periodically frozen construction in West Bank settlements.

   Moreover, in 2009, he became the first leader in Likud’s history to publicly adhere to the notion of “two states for two peoples.” That said, he also understands — unlike former US president Barack Obama, who tried to impose on him that slippery and inconclusive terrain of territorial concessions after the failure of the Oslo Accords — that negotiations aren’t making any headway because the Palestinians actually reject the existence of the Jewish state.

   It is for this reason that he has pursued an effective regional strategy, which could include the Palestinians in the future, through the Abraham Accords. His gaining of sympathy from neighboring Arab countries for his project is based, above all, on his courageous determination to oppose even the United States, or rather Obama, when Iran became a deceptive interlocutor for them. Netanyahu knows that his choice to speak sincerely before the US Congress in 2015 about the Iranian nuclear threat was risky and critical, but it opened doors to an incredible broadening of horizons among Islamic countries facing that same threat.

   Through his strategy, Netanyahu has pushed Israel on the path of its long-term mission as a small but great, beneficent power — one that can help other countries tackle issues from water conservation to the fight against terrorism, from satellites to vaccines and from high-tech to medicine. In short, Israel under Netanyahu has become indispensable to the entire world.

   This article was translated from Italian by Amy Rosenthal.

   Journalist Fiamma Nirenstein was a member of the Italian Parliament (2008-13), where she served as vice president of the Committee on Foreign Affairs in the Chamber of Deputies. She served in the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, and established and chaired the Committee for the Inquiry Into Anti-Semitism. A founding member of the international Friends of Israel Initiative, she has written 13 books, including Israel Is Us (2009). Currently, she is a fellow at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs.

2. This is Arutz Sheva’s account of Mansour Abbas’ speech:

   blockquoteUnited Arab List chief: We will return state land to our people
   Coalition partner in incoming government addresses Knesset in Arabic. ‘No one sold out the Negev, it will stay part of Israel.’

   Mansour Abbas
   United Arab List (Ra’am) party chairman Mansour Abbas addressed the Knesset in both Arabic and Hebrew Sunday, discussing his decision to support the incoming national unity government led by Naftali Bennett (Yamina) and Yair Lapid (Yesh Atid).

   In his address, made during a special session of the Knesset convened to vote on the new government, Abbas rejected claims by right-wing critics that the new government had ‘sold out’ the Negev by recognizing illegal Bedouin settlements.

   “No one sold out the Negev,” said Abbas. “It will remain a part of the State of Israel. Our vision is to live in peace, equality, and cooperation.”

   Abbas also vowed, in Arabic, that his party would “return the lands which were appropriated from our people.”

   “This is a national act of the highest order.” block quote

   Religious Zionist Party chief Bezalel Smotrich responded to Abbas’ comments, saying: “So Abbas is once again putting on a spectacular show of hypocrisy, with a nationalistic speech in Arabic in which he says the truth; a speech full of soothing words in Hebrew intended for Jewish listeners who are blind and deaf, especially those who make themselves so.”

3. peloni’s points are all excellent. Thanks, peloni.

4. This is from today’s Times of Israel:

   In speech before swearing-in, Ra’am leader vows to ‘reclaim expropriated lands’
   Mansour Abbas also pledges to tackle violence in Arab community; Joint List leaders bemoan ‘right-wing’ policies underpinning new government

   By Amy Spiro and Aaron BoxermanToday, 9:46 pm
   Ra’am leader Mansour Abbas speaks to the Knesset plenum on June 13, 2021. (Noam Moskowitz/Knesset)
   Ra’am leader Mansour Abbas, whose support provided the key backing needed for the incoming change government’s majority, vowed to reclaim land in Israel that was “expropriated” from Arab Israelis.

   “We will reclaim the lands that were expropriated from our people, this is a national cause of the first degree,” Abbas said in Arabic in his speech before the Knesset plenum Sunday evening.

   Switching to Hebrew for the end his speech, Abbas noted that “we come from different nations, different religions, and different sectors. There is one thing that connects all citizens of Israel and that is citizenship.”

   Abbas rejected claims from the right that the incoming government “sold the south of Israel” to his party.

   “Nobody sold the south to Ra’am, it remains in the State of Israel,” Abbas said. “The citizens of the south are citizens of the State of Israel. There is a disagreement about the ownership of the lands — this happens in all modern countries that deal with situations like this.”

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   The coalition deal signed between Ra’am and Yesh Atid includes the formal recognition of three Bedouin communities in the South, as well as extending the freeze of the Kaminitz Law — which cracks down on on illegal construction — until the end of 2024.

   Abbas also emphasized that his party would seek to handle violent crime among Arab Israelis.

   “Violence and organized crime pose grave danger to our lives, and the highest value we believe in is the value of human life. How can we claim to be patriots even as we fail to protect our nation’s children?” Abbas said.

   “Our patience is long. We shall proceed onward in this path,” Abbas said.

   Abbas said his party will work “to advance a dialogue that will bring about better, new, principled relations for all citizens of the state: Jews and Arabs.” The Ra’am leader said joining the new coalition “will also bridge the gaps on the national level and the religious level, and will bring us together to a dialogue that will help us understand each other and not view each other as enemies.”

   Joint List head Ayman Odeh addresses the Knesset plenum on June 13, 2021. (Noam Moskowitz/Knesset)
   Joint List leader Ayman Odeh, whose party did not support the incoming government, called the new coalition “a bad government.”

   “Today, a lot of people in the country are happy, and it’s easy to understand why,” he said. “There is room for joy, but there is no room for complacency.”

   Odeh lamented that the interior, justice, and finance ministries are held by representatives of “the extreme right” — Yamina’s Ayelet Shaked, New Hope’s Gideon Sa’ar, and Yisrael Beytenu’s Avigdor Liberman, respectively.

   “We are looking for a different type of cooperation between Jews and Arabs, based on peace, equality, democracy, and social justice that is not in this government,” Odeh said.

   Before he was sworn in as health minister in the new government, Meretz leader Nitzan Horowitz said during his speech that Ra’am’s participation “is the answer to all the racism and those who carried out violence who want to mark all Arabs in this country as the enemy.” The move “is good news to those who believe in Arab-Jewish cooperation also in the hallways of the Knesset and the government.”

   Meretz leader Nitzan Horowitz speaks to the Knesset on June 13, 2021. (Noam Moskowitz/Knesset)
   Joint List MK Ahmad Tibi warned that the new government will be even more right-wing than the coalition it is replacing.

   “Something good is happening today,” namely Benjamin Netanyahu’s removal from power, following years of his “division and hatred” directed at Arab Israelis, said Tibi.

   “But the alternative is right-wing, even more right-wing. I heard the prime minister-designate, and he spoke about strengthening the settlements. He spoke about regulation and sovereignty in the south,” Tibi said, adding that Arab Israelis know those words are euphemisms for plans that will harm the Bedouin communities in southern Israel.

   Defense Minister Benny Gantz, formerly Netanyahu’s coalition partner, thanked him for his contributions to Israel despite the bad blood between them.

   “We’ll take it from here,” said Gantz during his speech.

   Religious Zionism MK Bezalel Smotrich waves photos of victims of terror during Prime Minister-designate Naftali Bennett’s speech on the Knesset floor on June 13, 2021. (Noam Moskowitz/Knesset)
   Earlier Sunday, Prime Minister-designate Naftali Bennett’s speech to the Knesset floor ahead of the vote that propelled him into office was repeatedly disrupted by shouting, heckling, and Knesset members being ejected from the plenum for their behavior.

   At the very outset of his speech, Bennett was interrupted by Religious Zionism party leader Bezalel Smotrich, who held up images of victims of terror, shouting, “You should be ashamed of yourself!” along with other members of his faction.

   Smotrich and several other Religious Zionism MKs were removed from the Knesset floor for breaking the rule against waving banners or signs in the plenum. The hecklers shouted “liar,” “crook” and “vote stealer,” as Bennett spoke.

   Outgoing Knesset Speaker Yariv Levin, of Likud, repeatedly and consistently warned the offending lawmakers that they would be removed from the floor for their disruptions. A series of Likud and Shas MKs was also evicted from the Knesset floor for their ongoing heckling of Bennett.

   As the interruptions continued, Bennett’s children, who were sitting in the Knesset gallery, formed heart shapes with their hands to send a message of support for their father.

   The Associated Press contributed to this report.

   Notice that the article does not contain any reference to an office that Odeh will hold. Earlier reports said he would be a deputy minister in the Prime Minister’s Office.

   All of the coalition agreements were supposed to have been published by Friday. But I have not seen them in any English language site. Does anyone who reads Hebrew know if they have been published there?

   If they have not been published, that is a clear violation of Israeli law.

5. Bennett is officially Prime Minister he was sworn in.

6. (2 of 2)
   It should be noted that the curious rise of the Arab street within Israel after so many years of coexisted quiet with only slight levels of altercation just happened to be simultaneous to the use of this Brotherhood Dentist as a political crutch upon which a broken Right-wing sought his support.

   It may be an unrelated coincidence, but the timing should be noted and considered.

   Furthermore, if these two events were an unrelated by cause and effect, at a minimum, it should be documented as fact that the acceptance of the Brotherhood into the political realm of acceptance appeared to do nothing to forestall such violent tendencies as the Riots and Rockets escapade or the threats of great violence should the Jews have the temerity to wave the State Flag in a civil procession near the Arab areas of dominance in the Capital.

   I can not protest strongly enough the ill-conceived inclusion of this political group based on principles of antisemitism within the body politic of the Jewish State.

   A year ago, I would have thought it rediculous to consider any would support such a measure, let alone both halves of a splintered Right-wing.
   /2

7. (1 of 2)
   Abbas’s comments from the live feed on TOI

   Abbas: No one ‘sold the Negev’ to us, we must stop seeing each other as enemies

   Ra’am’s Abbas dismisses criticism of the incoming government for promising him generous funding for Arab communities in the Negev as part of the coalition agreements.

   “We want all the parties to think differently. No one sold the Negev to Ra’am. The Negev remains in Israel, its residents are citizens of Israel,” he says.

   The reality is that the Bedouin stole these lands that are being granted to them on behalf of the Muslim Brotherhood.

   The lands were stolen under Bibi who failed to address the theft and these same theft-ed lands are now granted to these same thieves by Bennett.

   It is intolerable, in truth, that such things were both unaddressed for so long by Bibi and that this is among the first decisions of Bennett’s new gov’t.

   But the greatest crime of all, regarding this land grant to the Bedouin, actually has nothing to do with the land or with the Bedouin.

   Rather the true crime is the ascendancy of the Brotherhood into the role of an acceptable partner who now owns the claims of gaining the grants of lands within the Negev as well as great financial stipends to the Israeli Arabs.

   These awards of legitimacy and recognition to a group, who has been party to every calamity to fall upon the Jewish people for the past century, is wrong.

   The Brotherhood, whose creation was borne from the rape of Hebron nearly one century ago, have violently opposed the population of Jews in the British Mandate, met and supported, at minimum, the German Nazis who murdered our millions, and have carried out too many acts of murder and mayhem upon the Jews to list in anything less than a lengthy volume.

   And if such a volume were to be kept current it would require a new edition as of last month to include coordinated attacks of the Riots and Rockets from their cohorts in Gaza and will likely require a new chapter when the Flag Parade is finally allowed, should it not be deemed too upsetting to these political allies and civil disruptors.

   It is now wrong for Bennett, as it was first wrong for Bibi, to organize and accept any political succor from such a group or to dismiss the danger that is necessarily the consequence of these acts of toleration in the face of their continued intolerance of the Jewish State.

   Abbas does not accept the right of Israel to exist. Their words suggesting coexistence are false as is made plain by the history of the party they represent which is thickly coated with blood from their Jewish many victims, some of whom are just recently placed into their graves.
   /1

8. If they don’t have the votes by the end of the day, can it be pushed into tomorrow or the next day? Or does that send the mandate to the Knesset? Does anyone know?

9. The vote was scheduled for 4pm. As far as I can tell, it is now 6.30 pm in Israel, and still no vote. I wonder what is holding it up.

10. Bennett speech to send message of cooperation to US, oppose return to Iran deal
    In remarks before the proposed government’s swearing-in, the PM-designate’s office says he’ll praise Biden for backing Israel against Hamas; will also stress commitment to Haredim
    By Tal Schneider and TOI staff Today, 3:37 pm

    In a speech to the Knesset plenum before lawmakers vote Sunday on confirming the “change government,” Prime Minister-designate Naftali Bennett’s message to the United States will be “positive and one of cooperation,” his office said.

    Bennett, who heads the right-wing Yamina party, is expected to thank US President Joe Biden for supporting Israel during last month’s military conflict with the Gaza-ruling Hamas terror group.

    However, his office said he will also express staunch opposition to an American return to the 2015 nuclear deal limiting Iran’s nuclear program, maintaining Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s hawkish stance toward Tehran, though parties that have spoken about keeping disagreements with the US behind closed doors will represent an overwhelming majority at the cabinet table.

    Bennett’s speech is scheduled to take place when the Knesset session to vote on the proposed government kicks off at 4 p.m.

    He will also reach out the families of two Israeli citizens being held in Gaza by Hamas, Avera Mengistu and Hisham al-Sayed, and those of two soldiers killed in the 2014 Gaza war, Oron Shaul and Hadar Goldin, whose bodies the terrorist organization is believed to be holding, stressing his commitment to returning them to Israel.

    “I raised my hand in the cabinet during the vote in which we sent Hadar and Oron to fight for us in Operation Protective Edge. I see their return as a sacred duty, which must be done with responsibility,” Bennett is set to say.

    He is likewise expected to extend a hand to ultra-Orthodox Israeli Jews, assuring them that the new government is committed to them even though the Haredi parties in Netanyahu’s right-wing religious bloc have ruled out joining the coalition and staunchly opposed its formation.

    He will also likely mention the deadly crush earlier this year during Lag B’Omer celebrations at Mount Meron in which 45 worshipers were killed, the worst peacetime disaster in Israel’s history. The prospective government has vowed to set up an official state commission of inquiry into the tragedy, whose victims were mainly Haredi Jews.

    On Friday, Channel 12 news reported that Bennett plans to use the speech to praise Netanyahu and thank him for his service to the country, despite the bad blood between them.

    While Netanyahu has spent the past several weeks disparaging Bennett for forming a “dangerous” government, the Yamina chief will not criticize the Likud leader and will adopt a conciliatory approach, the network said.

    Bennett will also seek to reassure the public that the new, eight-party government will work for all segments of society, including those that have not supported his decision to build a coalition with Yesh Atid chairman Yair Lapid and more left-leaning parties as well as the Islamist party Ra’am, according to the television report.

    If confirmed, the unlikely alliance of right-wing, left-wing, centrist and Islamist parties will remove Netanyahu from power after 12 consecutive years, to be replaced by Bennett, and, two years later, Lapid. Its swearing-in hangs on a single vote, with 61 of the Knesset’s 120 lawmakers expected to back the fragile political alliance.

11. Farewell to the best
    In at least one field, Benjamin Netanyahu was the best prime minister Israel has ever had.

    Gary Willig , Jun 13 , 2021 11:45 AM

    Today marks the end of an era, the end of the 12-year reign of Benjamin Netanyahu, the longest-serving prime minister of Israel.

    Even if he returns to office, as he did in 2009, 10 years after the end of his first term, much will still be written of how Netanyahu could not form a coalition despite his Likud party winning 30 seats and becoming the largest faction in the Knesset by far. Historians will document every detail of how it was not his ideological opponents, but rather former allies he had angered over the years, who brought him down.

    But even if it is the end of Netanyahu’s career as prime minister, it would be a mistake to focus solely on the end. Benjamin Netanyahu deserves to be remembered as one of the historic and great prime ministers of Israel.

    Netanyahu is no David Ben Gurion or Menachem Begin. He did not create build the state from nothing or defend it when it was newly born and weak from attackers on all sides. Nor did he end one-party rule, give voice to Israel’s marginalized communities for the first time, and sign the first peace deal with an Arab nation. The challenges he faced were different, but his accomplishments are no less revolutionary.

    Benjamin Netanyahu is the best prime minister Israel has ever had when it comes to the field of foreign policy, and it isn’t even close.

    Before Netanyahu, and especially following the Oslo Accords, it was taken for granted that Israel’s standing in the world depended on the state of the peace negotiations with the Palestinian Authority. Many countries, including China and India, only started to normalize relations with Israel in the wake of the Oslo Accords.

    This situation gave the Palestinian Authority and its leaders, Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud Abbas, effective veto power over Israel’s foreign policy. As long as they refused to make peace with Israel, there was a limit to how far the international community would be willing to embrace Israel. International bodies would reflexively condemn Israel, most of the world would give Israel the cold shoulder, and even Israel’s closest allies and trading partners in Europe and the US would often be hyper-critical of Israel’s policies and demand it give in to the PA.

    This all began to change when Netanyahu took office in 2009. He had a different idea for how foreign policy should be conducted, one that seems obvious in hindsight, but was revolutionary in practice: decouple foreign policy from the state of Israel’s relations with the PA.

    Netanyahu realized that Israel had what to offer the world. The Jewish State was no longer the fragile, poor country of the 1950s. Israel had weathered the global financial crisis of 2008 better than most other countries and had become a hub of innovation and technology. Netanyahu was the first prime minister to see the potential Israel’s newfound ‘Start-Up Nation’ status had for international relations.

    Nations act first and foremost in their own interest. Netanyahu capitalized on this by reaching out to nations Israel had not reached to before or had not reached out to in decades. For the first time, Israel’s foreign policy was not centered on the US and western Europe, but included reaching out to eastern Europe, Latin America, Africa, and eastern Asia.

    Netanyahu’s approach proved itself when many nations began to move closer to Israel. Their interests in Israeli know-how and technology trumped ideological commitment to the Palestinian Arabs. It no longer made sense to wait until the PA said yes to peace to enjoy the benefits of a closer relationship with Israel.

    The list of nations with which Israel has better relations now than it ever has before is staggering. India, the nation with the second-largest population and formerly one of Israel’s harshest critics on the world stage, is now a friendly nation. The nations of the former Soviet bloc such as Hungary. Even Russia, where much of the anti-Israel propaganda which infects left-wing discourse in the left originated during the Soviet era, enjoys its warmest-ever relations with Israel today. The coordination between the Israeli and Russian militaries in Syria would have been unthinkable in earlier eras.

    Israel has made inroads in Latin America, with close friendships with Brazil and Honduras. It has begun to return to Africa, where many nations severed relations with the Jewish State following the 6-Day and Yom Kippur Wars. Israel even enjoys a closer relationship with China, one of the last remaining communist nations.

    This improvement to Israel’s standing extends not only to far-flung regions, but applies closer to home as well. During Netanyahu’s tenure, Israel developed an unprecedented partnership with the nations of the Arab Gulf, largely to counter the shared threat posed by Iran.

    Initially, this partnership was kept behind closed doors, even if it was an open secret. But last year, it came out into the open with the signing of the Abraham Accords.

    Netanyahu has the distinction of being the Israeli Prime Minister to sign the most peace agreements with Arab nations. Menachem Begin signed one with Egypt, Yitzchak Rabin signed one with Jordan. Netanyahu signed four, yes, four peace agreements with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco, and Sudan.

    These agreements are different from the cold peace agreements with Egypt and Jordan. These nations truly want to be Israel’s friends. They want economic cooperation, and have taken steps to signal a new era of tolerance and respect for Jews within their borders.

    The normalization agreement with Sudan is especially significant, as Sudan’s capital of Khartoum is where the leaders of the Arab nations gathered in 1967 to issue their ‘Three No’s:’ ‘No peace with Israel, no recognition of Israel, and no negotiations with Israel.’

    Israel’s improved relations with the Arab world are not limited to these four nations. The Abraham Accords, the name given to the peace deals, were made possible thanks to the support of Saudi Arabia.

    Netanyahu does not deserve sole credit for the Abraham Accords. Much of the credit must go o former US President Donald Trump and especially Trump’s Middle East negotiating team: Jared Kushner, Jason Greenblatt, and Avi Berkowitz. But Netanyahu deserves credit for creating the groundwork for the peace deals by pursuing closer relations despite the lack of progress with the PA and proving Israel can be a powerful ally against Iran. And he deserves credit for being able to finalize the agreements that brought these new friendships out into the open and upended the conventional wisdom that a peace agreement with the PA must come first.

    Netanyahu’s accomplishments are hardly limited to the arena of foreign policy. Israel’s economy remained strong and continued to grow under his watch, partially thanks to reforms Netanyahu implemented as Finance Minister in the 2000s. Without this economic strength, many of his foreign policy successes would not have been possible.

    Netanyahu also deserves the gratitude of each and every citizen of Israel for acting quickly to purchase millions of coronavirus vaccines from the Pfizer pharmaceutical company when they were developed late last year. Israel became the fastest country in the world to vaccinate its population against the deadly disease, saving hundreds of lives and allowing life to gradually return to normal. This was another success which was dependent on the economic strength Netanyahu delivered, as he paid top dollar to ensure Israel would be first in line to receive the vaccines.

    Alas, no record is perfect, and even in foreign policy, there are a few blemishes on Netanyahu’s record.

    Israel’s Foreign Ministry has been woefully underfunded and neglected for many years. In addition, Israel’s hasbara has been insufficient to put it mildly. The Jewish State has done little to counter the growth of ideological anti-Semitism on the western left. The spread of lies about Israel make it more difficult for the still-tiny state to defend itself when attacked by murderous adversaries such as Hamas and Hezbollah and has significantly contributed to the resurgence of anti-Semitism across western Europe and the US. These failures are on Netanyahu.

    Despite these blemishes, Netanyahu leaves office with Israel’s standing in the world far better than it was in March 2009. Israel enjoys a level of respect and acceptance across the world it never has seen before. It has friendships which even the most optimistic observer could have conceived of 12 years ago.

    These friendships and alliances will not disappear just because Netanyahu is leaving office. If they were, then they would be hollow achievements at best. Hopefully Prime Minister-delegate Naftali Bennett and future prime ministers will be able to build on them to further elevate Israel’s standing. Bennett has many of the same skills as Netanyahu, including an understanding of the US and the ability to speak eloquently in English. And he is clearly a skilled negotiator, having been able to maneuver himself into the premiership with a party of just seven seats. Time will tell how those skills will translate to the world stage.

    So farewell, Prime Minister Netanyahu. In one area, at least, you truly were the best.