The results of this week’s elections pose the direst threat to Israeli democracy since the state was founded 74 years ago. Israel has always been under existential threat from the enemies around it. It fought for independence, endured numerous wars and waged endless military operations over the years. Overcoming all odds, Israel transformed itself from an underdog into a regional military, technological and scientific superpower, from a destitute barren land into a prosperous state. For years, it dismissed warnings that the real danger to its future lay within its fractured social, religious and political structure, rejecting them as leftist propaganda and prophecies of doom.

If they implement their plans and realize their ideology, the ultranationalist and religious partners in the emerging coalition government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu could eventually turn Israel into a quasi-authoritarian state similar to Hungary under Prime Minister Viktor Orban, Turkey under Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the Philippines under Rodrigo Duterte and Bongbong Marcos.

While Israeli journalists and other critics are unlikely to be thrown in jail, legal and political maneuvers depleting the Supreme Court of its authority and independence are very realistic in the absence of a constitution guaranteeing a separation of powers. Endemic corruption, human rights violations, curbs on minority rights, erosion of the LGBTQ community’s hard-won achievements and a takeover of the state coffers by the ultra-Orthodox minority are all tangible threats. As of this week, they are no longer gloomy scenarios but projects in the making.

Netanyahu was a keen guardian of Israel’s legal system during several of his years in politics, his views on democracy shaped by a liberal upbringing and formative years spent in the United States. But Netanyahu owes this week's resounding comeback after 18 months in political exile to ultranationalist and ultra-Orthodox forces. The Religious Zionism and Jewish Power parties, along with the ultra-Orthodox parties Shas and United Torah Judaism, gave him the commanding 64-seat Knesset majority he needed to resume power, and they will now hold him hostage.