The most decisive moments in the negotiations between Iran and the superpowers caught Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the swearing-in ceremony for the 20th Knesset March 31. Netanyahu divided his time between attending official events marking the occasion and receiving classified intelligence reports containing information about the talks’ progress.

Even when it became clear that the talks had reached a dead end this Tuesday, Netanyahu refused to deceive himself. “An agreement will be reached in the end,” his innermost circle said. “The superpowers, headed by the United States, are eager to reach an agreement, so even if the deadline is extended and the final agreements are postponed until later, it will happen in the end,” they said.

Netanyahu, who would have had a great career as a copywriter, used the time to come up with a new catchphrase for what was happening. He refers to the turbulent events of March 2015 as the “Tehran-Lausanne-Yemen axis,” linking Tehran with the Houthi rebels now seizing control of Yemen and the nuclear negotiations in Lausanne. In other words, he made all the UN Security Council superpowers, including the United States, into an integral part of these events, which, he claims, threaten the very future and peace of the free world.

But that wasn’t Netanyahu’s only headache. After he won the March election despite all projections and polls, President Reuven Rivlin tasked him with the formation of the next government. Now he must make the strategic decision of what kind of government he will form. In other words, he must decide on the nature of the government he wants to lead over the next few years. His heart and gut are telling him to form the government he promised, a narrow right-wing/ultra-Orthodox government with a stable majority of 67 Knesset members. Such a coalition would include HaBayit HaYehudi Chair Naftali Bennett, Yisrael Beitenu leader Avigdor Liberman, Kulanu head Moshe Kahlon and the ultra-Orthodox parties. It would allow Netanyahu to implement the ideology he brought with him to the election, and to abandon Israel’s political center, diplomatic pragmatism and apparently, the enlightened world at large.