The laconic joint statement issued in the pre-dawn hours of April 16 by aides to Blue and White party Chair Benny Gantz and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gave no hint of the dramatic six-hour coalition negotiations between the two political rivals on the formation of an emergency power-sharing government. “The teams will continue to talk tomorrow in order to arrive at an agreement on a national emergency government,” according to the statement.

This was not the news Gantz had hoped to deliver at the end of the weeklong Passover holiday, but the deadline set by President Reuven Rivlin for him to form Israel’s next government expired at midnight on April 15. Rivlin, who appears thoroughly fed up with Netanyahu’s foot-dragging, wasted no time and immediately handed the mandate to the Knesset. Under Israeli law, unless one of the 120 members of the legislature can drum up a majority and form a new government within 21 days, Israelis will head to the polls this summer for the fourth time since April 2019.

So what has been going on in recent weeks in negotiations conducted behind closed doors at the Prime Minister’s official residence on Jerusalem’s Balfour Street and on the two sides’ Zoom screens?

With every passing day, Gantz and his people have been growing increasingly certain that Netanyahu is simply unable to sign a coalition agreement that would remove him from power in 18 months and hand his chair to Gantz. Looking back, they realize that every time an agreement appeared on the verge of completion, Netanyahu came up with new conditions. That was the case when Gantz and Netanyahu agreed March 20 on a rotation mechanism triggering an automatic job switch between them within 18 months, and on a roadmap to impose Israeli sovereignty over West Bank lands in accordance with President Donald Trump’s peace plan. Everything appeared ready, but Netanyahu pressed the pause button.