Gadi Eisenkot, chairman of the Yashar party, together with party members, attends the presentation of the party’s candidate list ahead of the upcoming general elections in Rosh HaAyin, September 7, 2026. (Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)
It’s Tuesday, September 8, and there is a reality show in Israel. Like Love Island, the goal is for everyone to find their match and pair up, with those left alone likely to be eliminated. You can compete alone, but convincing the audience to back you becomes far harder. Last night the show finalized its contestants for its 26th season. It’s called Israeli politics.
Recently, in the Knesset: after being rejected time and again by Ofer Winter, Netanyahu forced Bezalel Smotrich to pair off with the libertarian Moshe Feiglin in a technical bloc. Eisenkot and Bennett eyed one another all week but never got together. Chili Tropper created a broken Zionist Home, divorcing Yoaz Hendel for Eisenkot; Hendel quickly turned around and jumped into a partnership with economist Yaron Zelekha and his new Reservists-and-Economy list. Gilad Erdan’s Unity withdrew altogether after he and Benny Gantz couldn’t go the distance. Avi Maoz and his religious Noam stayed single and are heading for elimination—as is Moti Leitner’s breakaway Haredi Public party.
That was a frantic series of forced relationships and breakups in the days before the lists were finalized last night.
But no reality show is complete without the bigger alliances. In bloc terms, Eisenkot got the better of the reshuffle, securing Tropper’s votes at the cost of only Hendel and Gantz. There’s a reason he opened the door to Tropper and not Hendel: they are looking in different directions—Eisenkot toward a minority government and the Arab parties, Hendel and Gantz toward Likud and national unity.
Netanyahu, meanwhile, has the votes of Noam and Haredi Public heading for the furnace, and—most troublingly—got no resolution on his biggest problem, Ofer Winter. Winter sits right on the threshold, poised to burn the maximum number of votes if he falls short. The stability Smotrich offered simply wasn’t attractive; Winter’s pitch is no old parties, a new face, and he wants to go the distance.
Inside the lists, Israel’s Marjorie Taylor Greene, Tally Gotliv, left Netanyahu for Ben Gvir, much to the former’s relief. The Knesset’s longest-serving member, United Torah Judaism’s Moshe Gafni, was dropped from the slate on the orders of his own party’s spiritual leader, Rabbi Dov Lando, over the collapse of the Haredi draft law. But the most notable thing about the lists is the theme they set for the season: October 7 and the reservists.
Beyond Hendel’s obvious claim to the title, every party stocked its slate with post-October 7 figures. Bennett’s B’Yachad advertises nine active reservists. Winter’s Amcha Yisrael is fielding bereaved parents, an October 7 widow, and an evacuated resident of Israel’s north. Lieberman’s Yisrael Beytenu brought more bereaved parents, a hostage’s family, and reserve officers. Even Netanyahu saved two of his reserved spots for Elisha Medan, an IDF reservist who lost both legs fighting in Gaza and Talik Gvili, mother of Ran Gvili, the slain police officer and final hostage.
Who gets eliminated, and who makes the final cut? The campaign begins in earnest. Keep reading for updates on the show as we count down to the season finale—just 49 days away.
British Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband. (Ed_Miliband/X)
Remember when Europe recognized a Palestinian state, and it expedited the end of the war, the return of the hostages, and the emergence of a moderate Palestinian leadership? Neither do I. Yet the lesson the new British foreign secretary Ed Miliband took from that diplomatic dud was that moderation and a future for peace were only ever one “comprehensive reset” in relations with Israel away—with impending sanctions on settlements in Judea and Samaria among its first instalments.
The ostensible justification is Israeli construction in the E1 corridor, connecting Jerusalem to Ma’ale Adumim and bisecting a Palestinian entity in the process. Miliband declared he would “not acquiesce in the destruction of the two-state solution.”
He chose to discuss the new policy with, of all people, the Emir of Qatar—one would think he might have spared the British taxpayer international charges, given how many jihadists and terror-supporters he can call locally.
They could, of course, address the problem of radicalization at home. If they were truly internationally inclined, they might begin by ensuring they can actually deploy a force when a war breaks out, rather than it taking a week and furious negotiations for their dock to outfit a single ship. They might consider answering Argentina, which spent this week threatening British sovereignty over the Falklands—I would suggest starting by not giving away their military base at Diego Garcia for no reason in particular. But this is the same party whose last defense secretary, John Healey, resigned due to a lack of seriousness in funding the military—the true bone and sinew of geopolitics.
Easier, always, than confronting a problem foreign or domestic is to blame the Jews—because naturally it is not the failure of British integration, but Israel’s actions in Gaza, that have clogged their streets and defaced their national monuments. After all, if not for the war, the UAE might still be willing to send its students to British universities without fear of their being radicalized by the Muslim Brotherhood.
But the true absurdity of the policy is that the two-state solution is not dying because of a 12-kilometre stretch of land outside Jerusalem. Its death was a suicide—perpetrated by a Palestinian Authority that time after time eschewed moderation and reform, enabled by an international community that entertained and sponsored its endless incitement. Were two states ever to be revived, it would not be by holding territory in trust in the hope that Palestinians will grow moderate enough to manage it, but by imposing consequences for their intransigence. I should think it obvious that sanctioning literal terror sponsors and celebrators would do significantly more for peace than sanctioning Jewish residents of East Jerusalem. Then again, Keir Starmer’s insistence when recognizing Palestine that it was “not a reward for Hamas” attests to the fact that British policy no longer understands the obvious.
Yet it is sadly predictable. If Israel could forget the lessons of the Yom Kippur War before October 7, it is only natural that the British, after so much longer, have forgotten the consequences of appeasement.
Israeli reserve soldiers take part in a military drill in the Golan Heights, northern Israel, May 8, 2024. (Ayal Margolin/Flash90)
In the heart-wrenching days following October 7, few sights were as consoling as the scenes of Israelis scrambling to find their way home to serve. El Al filled all 279 seats on the Boeing 777, then took on roughly 30 more people beyond capacity; for the first time in more than 40 years, El Al flew on Shabbat, pressured by the crowds of backpackers clamoring at the gates to get home.
One of the thousands was a British reservist, who left his home in London on October 8—only to find himself prosecuted on his return, with help from an Israeli lawyer.
In November 2025 the International Centre of Justice for Palestinians took him to court on the claim that he had violated the Foreign Enlistment Act 1870, a Victorian statute written to stop British subjects serving as mercenaries. The Act does not apply to dual nationals. Soldier A was not enlisting but reporting under an existing obligation. Both facts—as well as repeated statements by successive British governments confirming exactly that—were known to ICJP, which lodged the case regardless.
ICJP alleged that he had enlisted of his own volition, not under a reservist obligation, despite having received a call-up order. It did so on the basis of a statement from Israeli lawyer Michal Pomeranz, who—in her capacity as a member of the Israeli Bar—declared that the call-up order does not explicitly require return to Israel for those residing abroad or travelling. But the letter of the law is not the scandalous aspect of her participation.
Pomeranz publicly acknowledged that the ICJP intended to prosecute at least nine named British citizens who had participated in reserve duty. Regardless, she used her Israeli law license, and her supposed expertise in Israeli law, to supply legal ammunition to a dangerous, extremist anti-Israel organization whose sole purpose was to prosecute reservists not for any ethical violation but for simply showing up.
The judge dismissed ICJP’s argument as “fundamentally misconceived in law” and the suit as “driven by an improper motive and facilitated by serious breaches of the duty of candor.” In June the court ordered ICJP to pay £82,130 in costs.
Pomeranz is now facing an ethics complaint with the Israeli Bar Association, lodged by the prosecuted soldier. Her actions are more than simply unethical. Helping to prosecute the people who came from thousands of miles away to protect you and your family in an hour of need is not only a betrayal of the country and the military, but a desecration of that sacred unity that followed October 7.
English Editor: Ari Tatarka
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Pomeranz, A shanda of Shanda’s.
Has the "death" of the two state solution really been solely the responsibility of the Palestinians and the international community, as you say "a suicide—perpetrated by a Palestinian Authority that time after time eschewed moderation and reform, enabled by an international community that entertained and sponsored its endless incitement." Isn't the reality much more complex? I would like to read your analysis, normally excellent, of Israel's missteps, and its lack of taking steps, along the path to a durable and just peace. What has been the impact on the Palestinian polity becoming more moderate and the ability to reach a two state solution with them of Israel's policies, for example: expanding settlement on the West Bank, the control, intimidation and brutality associated with the occupation, discriminatory home demolition, forcible transfer of Palestinians, arbitrary detention and torture, impunity for settler violence, exploitation of West Bank water resources, trade restrictions and impeding the PA's ability to deliver services by withholding tax revenues for salaries paid to civil servants and other purposes? Despite this, the PA, which recognized Israel and renounced violence, has according to many top Israeli defence and intelligence officials been an excellent security partner.