With Netanyahu increasingly seen as isolated, Israeli PM dismisses 'petty politics'

One of the most common opinions offered up by Israeli protesters out in large numbers over the past week demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is that he will prolong Israel's stated war against Hamas in Gaza as long as it takes — and no matter the cost — to ensure his own political survival. 

To them, it's self-evident.

"Within a minute of the war [being] over, Netanyahu will be voted out," said Dorit Nagari, a 56-year-old biotech worker protesting outside the Israeli Parliament in Jerusalem on Tuesday.

"So he's losing his power. You know? The war is over. He's losing his power." 

Many Israelis taking part in what they called a "week of disruption" blame Netanyahu for security failings that allowed Hamas militants to invade Israeli border communities near Gaza in an unprecedented attack on Oct. 7, killing 1,200 people and kidnapping about 250 others, and for what they call his botched handling of a war now in its ninth month. 

They are angry over Netanyahu's failure to agree to a ceasefire deal as outlined by U.S. President Joe Biden in early June that would return Israeli hostages in stages and aim to establish a path towards regional stability and reconstruction of a post-war Gaza. 

Despite mounting pressure on Netanyahu from the families of Israeli hostages still held in Gaza, public criticism from the military establishment, an ill-tempered rebuke offending Israel's closest ally and cracks within his extreme-right coalition government, the man known as Israel's great survivor seems to be holding on. For now. 

"From Netanyahu's perspective, what he needs to do is just hang on till the end of July," said political analyst Gayil Talshir of Hebrew University. 

That's when the Knesset — Israel's Parliament — will recess for three months. 

"Netanyahu, you know, he's a genius in reading the political map and reshaping the discourse accordingly," Talshir said. 

But while the clock is ticking, pressure is building on Netanyahu. 

On Wednesday, the Israeli prime minister was forced to withdraw legislation he had promised his ultra-Orthodox coalition partners that would have given the government power to appoint hundreds of municipal rabbis after some members of his own Likud party refused to back it, unhappy with increased demands from the religious right. 

Another of Netanyahu's pledges – legislation to extend the exemption from military service that ultra-Orthodox men studying the Torah have historically enjoyed – may prove to be even more difficult to achieve. 

On Friday, the prime minister chastized his political partners, saying it wasn't the time for "petty politics or for legislation that endangers the coalition."