Israel's unity government walks a tightrope on COVID-19

A COVID-19 emergency brought both Prime Minister Netanyahu and his chief rival Benny Gantz on the same page. This is the impression that Israel's newly formed unity government is busy selling to the country, and the region at large.

But anyone with the slightest knowledge of Israel's political landscape would understand that protests are fairly rare in the country, let alone against the government.

On April 28, thousands of citizens roared onto the streets of Tel Aviv to protest against the controversial power-sharing deal, which achieved nothing but its central objective: to secure Netanyahu a 36-month-rule on the back of a COVID-19 emergency.

Understand, that the 14-page coalition document that lay the groundwork for this mysterious consensus, offered no revisions in Israel's rather contentious COVID-19 measures: an outsized role of the intelligence machinery, far-reaching electronic counterterrorism technology, conditional treatment of Arab minorities, and circumvention of the parliament. The deal also spelled out no exit strategy for COVID-19 in the event of Netanyahu's corruption trial.

An overbearing role of Israel's intelligence apparatus – the internal security giant Shin Bet – is a sharp test for the newly formed government. Israel's supreme court ruled last week that the government must bring its use of mobile phone tracking (which includes names, addresses, phone numbers, wire-tapping, electronic surveillance and clandestine data-crunching) under legislation.

Meanwhile, Netanyahu has consistently advertised this intelligence-driven approach to COVID-19 as a deterrent to "becoming infected and infecting others," undermining parliamentary oversight at every possible turn.

"Few politicians, even in the opposition, questioned the prime minister's exposure of a decades-long secret database touted as one of the Shin Bet's most powerful counterterrorism tools," writes prominent Israeli essayist Richard Silverstein. "They should have, because Netanyahu was clearly exploiting the existence of the tool to highlight for the public his indispensability. He wanted Israelis to view him as the strong, steady leader who could carry them through the threat posed by the epidemic."

Therefore, there are several implications of the unity government's vast politicization of COVID-19.

First, select businesses and schools are on the verge of re-opening, but the absence of opposition input makes it difficult to interpret it as a democratic exercise that puts citizens' interests first.

Second, Netanyahu's penchant for undercutting the Israeli parliament makes any economic revival less representative of the masses' COVID-19 exigencies – with many civil segments poised to take calculated risk at workplaces, businesses, schools, and commercial districts.

Most alarming is the government's insistence that Shin Bet deserves a pedestal, irking citizens to trade their privacy for survival. Israel's well-documented gains on COVID-19 – including an impressive decline in daily cases since late March – ends up giving people nothing but a binary preference: to choose privacy or health.

Gantz has been content keeping a low profile for now, allowing center-right skeptics to make a relative case for his COVID-19 leadership. "Netanyahu wants to guarantee he doesn't end up in court," said Ya'alon, leader of the conservative Telem party. "If instead of dealing with the coronavirus, [Gantz] hands Netanyahu immunity; there is no way to talk about him leading [the country]."

But Gantz's support for Netanyahu in the event of a corruption trial remains significantly untested. Preparations are on-course for a May 24 trial, with multiple reports citing "no impediments" to scrutinizing seven counts of three criminal charges against Israel's longest serving prime minister. Efforts by government authorities to ease COVID-19 restrictions and relax Israel's "state of emergency" add to Netanyahu's loss of leverage.

It is against this backdrop that Gantz may see little value in supporting his superior after all. With Netanyahu in the court ring, survival of the unity government becomes paramount. This, in turn demands that Gantz demonstrates his long-due, long-desired leadership.

It is important to note that Gantz's inclusion in the government itself is predicated on COVID-19 delivery, and less on Likud loyalties.

According to the power-sharing deal, the unity government would spend its first six months dealing with the pandemic. Both former rivals have also vowed to keep a "watchful eye" over any related economic crises it could bring to the pandemic response, and part of these economic costs are already evident: unemployment rates are peaking at 27 percent, and Netanyahu's image as a crisis manager stands contested by parliamentary defiance, legal maneuverings, and opposition strong-arming. In fact, the introduction of a COVID-19 emergency itself was an attempt to pause Netanyahu's indictment call.

There are more questions surrounding the sustainability of this brittle coalition arrangement. It was Gantz's inability to deal in majorities, and Likud's shortage of several seats, that got both leaders to unite under the current arrangement. The fact is that COVID-19 was always the rhetoric, but never the underlying basis for a Netanyahu-Gantz consensus.

Ultimately, the slightest of insistence from Gantz on distancing politics from COVID-19 (as Netanyahu nears the May 24 hearing), could hand the former military chief some of the reins. A pre-existing consensus already exists in Israel on the criticality of the pandemic, and the risks it affords to a possible resurgence. Any vacuum from Netanyahu would only reinforce the fragility of Israel's power-sharing deal, one that he touts as Israel's counterweight to COVID-19.