Optimists in the Blue and White Party predicted during the election campaign that winning 34 to 35 seats in the 120-member Knesset would be a political watershed. Any figure above the target, said the strategists of the newly minted party established to unseat Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, would guarantee them power.

On April 9, it turned out they had met their optimistic target but lost the fight. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud won the same number of votes for his Likud party, but is better positioned to form a government due to the strong showing of the right-wing bloc and its numerical advantage over the left and center-left. On April 11, after the final results were published, the Likud got one extra Knesset seat, reaching 36 mandates.

In fact, Netanyahu has devoured the right, wiped out his nemesis Naftali Bennett of the New Right Party, eliminated the outcast Zehut Party of Moshe Feiglin that had been a thorn in his side and managed to contain the ultra-right United Right Party, still leaving him sufficient partners with whom to form a stable government, his fifth. On the other hand, Lt. Gen. (res.) Benny Gantz and his Blue and White co-chair Yair Lapid brought Labor to a historic low by pirating its voters, leaving them with very few significant partners with whom to form a government. The fact that Israel’s Arab parties are not considered viable partners by the center-left and are not players in the coalition maneuvering makes the task of this political bloc virtually impossible.

What happens now? Blue and White was established on the fly to achieve a single goal: bringing down Netanyahu. It is led by a quartet consisting of former military chief Gantz, who hooked up with another former chief of staff, Lt. Gen. (res.) Moshe Ya’alon, who had formed the Telem Party. The two then joined forces with Lapid and drew in a third former military chief, Lt. Gen. (res.) Gabi Ashkenazi. It all happened within two weeks and two and a half months prior to election day. This patchwork creation is composed of representatives from the political right and left, social activists and additional generals (two former major generals, two police commissioners, a former deputy head of the Shin Bet agency and a former deputy Mossad chief). The quartet runs this strange hybrid from what has been dubbed “the cockpit,” with Gantz at the controls and the other three as co-pilots. Whether this strange creature can survive in Israel’s political jungle and opposition exile is unclear.