Could 'regional deal' be behind Israel's government crisis?

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon have been swapping verbal blows in recent days over the scheduled launching of the Israeli Public Broadcasting Corporation (IPBC), with Netanyahu threatening to call early elections if the unborn corporation is not dismantled. But is public broadcasting the real reason behind this commotion?

Actually, there are as many suppositions regarding this latest political crisis in Israel as there are pundits. Some say Netanyahu fears that the soon-to-be-launched IPBC is teeming with leftists and rivals. They also claim that the decision to appoint Geula Even-Saar as the broadcaster’s prime-time news anchor was the final straw for the Netanyahu couple. Even-Saar, a respected TV newswoman, is married to former Minister Gideon Saar, one of Netanyahu’s archrivals in the Likud Party.

Some believe Netanyahu wants to move up the elections, scheduled for 2019, to head off possible recommendations by the police and decisions by Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit to indict him, as police are conducting probes on several affairs allegedly involving Netanyahu.

Haaretz Editor-in-Chief Aluf Benn surmised that the crisis over the IPBC is nothing but camouflage for deep-seated disagreements with the United States over freezing West Bank settlement construction. He assumes this is Netanyahu’s escape hatch from the devilish choice between the romance with his buddy, US President Donald Trump, and the forced partnership with his domestic rival, pro-settlement HaBayit HaYehudi Party Chairman Naftali Bennett. Trump is demanding that he curb construction in the settlements, while Bennett threatens to bus the settlers to the ballot boxes in droves and bring to an end the hold on power by Netanyahu and his Likud.