The Israeli prime minister entering the Knesset on the day members are sworn in has traditionally been a festive occasion. On the afternoon of Oct. 3, the current officeholder arrived and entered almost without notice. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu entered through a side door, and once inside, he immediately disappeared into the room reserved for his Likud faction. An air of uncertainty surrounded him.

Just a few hours earlier, Netanyahu had met behind closed doors with Avigdor Liberman, chairman of Yisrael Beitenu, after a long period during which the two men did not communicate. Netanyahu had initiated the meeting, and in the end, all he got from it was reassurance that Liberman would not be the one to save him. Liberman will only join a secular unity government. Refusing to toss a lifeline, Liberman continues in his role as Netanyahu's political executioner. Further evidence of the meeting’s failure could be seen in Netanyahu’s almost desperate attempts to catch Liberman’s eye in the audience during his speech to the Knesset, especially when he spoke about the sensitive security situation, which he said demands unity. Liberman made a show of avoiding direct eye contact.

Netanyahu had no good news for his party. President Reuven Rivlin had granted him a mandate on Sept. 25 to form the next government, but one week on, Netanyahu was exactly where he had started, with a bloc of 55 Knesset members from the Likud, the ultra-Orthodox parties and Yamina, and nothing more on the horizon or any cause for hope. If anything, his situation had worsened. The Blue and White still refuses to sit in a government with him because of the criminal charges he faces. With the hearing on those charges having begun Oct. 2, Blue and White shows no signs of changing course.

Meanwhile, as if to show the seriousness of Blue and White's position, Knesset member Yair Lapid, the party's number two, announced that he would forgo his rotation agreement with party chairman Benny Gantz to serve as prime minister in a future government if doing so would advance the prospects of a unity government. Lapid did so after Netanyahu had spent several days accusing him of blocking a unity government because it would mean that Lapid would be denied a rotation as prime minister. While Lapid’s remarks had no practical significance — even if a unity government based on a rotating premiership were formed, it would be Gantz and the Likud candidate, not Lapid, trading places at the helm — it proved that despite differences of opinion and even tensions among Blue and White leaders, they were committed to fighting back against Netanyahu’s political maneuvering.