The unprecedented coalition agreement signed on April 20 between Interim Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Blue and White chair Benny Gantz means a major change in Israel’s system of government. The system in place for over 70 years whereby a prime minister heads the executive branch and administers a government of ministers as the first among equals is no more. It has been replaced by a government led by a premier and an “alternative,” a two-headed regime. No longer will one man have the final say. Two entirely different people will be forced to share the reins of governance.
Under their power-sharing deal, both Netanyahu and Gantz will live like prime ministers in official residences, protected and driven in convoys. Neither will be able to fire a minister from the other bloc. Netanyahu will manage his quota of 18 ministers and Gantz will handle his, though he intends to make do with fewer than his allotted share of 18 to quell public criticism of the monstrous government at a time of coronavirus-induced austerity.
The switch 18 months from when the government is sworn in will be approved in advance as part of a rotation bill voted on by the legislature in advance. The proposed bill includes a series of checks and balances, amendments and conditions that will regulate this unwieldy construction over the next few years. In 18 months, Netanyahu will stop being prime minister and be downgraded to “acting prime minister" and Gantz will take his place. Every important policy move and significant decision on appointments will require consensus. The next chief-of-staff of the Israel Defense Forces, police commissioner, attorney general, judges and more will need the agreement of both sides.
It will be a government of mutual paralysis. Though Netanyahu gets 18 additional months as prime minister, Gantz will block him on many issues, halting the destruction of Israel’s democratic institutions and legal system. Many in Israel regard the deal as corrupt and even morally reprehensible, while many others are breathing a sigh of relief over the breakthrough in the deadlock that has deprived Israel of an elected government for the past 17 months.
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