Walter Russell Mead
WSJ, Aug. 26, 2024
“Mr. Netanyahu is the bête noire of the international intelligentsia and the favorite whipping boy of the global press.”
Almost a year into Israel’s most challenging conflict since the 1948-49 War of Independence, one thing is increasingly clear about its embattled prime minister. Love him or loathe him, Benjamin Netanyahu is a historic leader who has imposed his will on the great events of his time.
To call Mr. Netanyahu a great leader is neither to predict his ultimate success nor to endorse everything he does. It certainly isn’t to call him infallible. But we can’t understand the course of the current conflict in the Middle East without giving Bibi his due. He is a political genius who towers above his critics and rivals. Despite his political vulnerabilities at home and the limits on Israeli power internationally, he has kept the threads of power in his hands far longer and to much greater effect than almost anyone expected after Oct. 7.
Consider his liabilities. He leads a deeply divided coalition in a deeply polarized country. Criminal cases against him are grinding through the courts. Thousands of Israelis regularly turn out in the streets to demand he step down. The Israeli military establishment is in open revolt, and the intelligence establishment despises him. Israel’s Supreme Court considers him a threat to constitutional order.
The Gaza war began with Hamas exposing the Jewish state’s catastrophic strategic and tactical failures. It will take years to assign precise responsibility for the host of intelligence, political and military errors that left so many Israelis vulnerable to the terrorists’ barbarity, but the key failures occurred on Bibi’s watch. … [To read the full article, click here]
