Bibi makes a strangely compelling case for his own necessity

Benjamin Netanyahu has revealed, that Israel has attacked Iranian weapons facilities in a move to hobble Russia.

Antony Blinken meets Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem on Monday. Picture: AFP

Benjamin Netanyahu remains the king of Israeli politics and the critical figure in the Middle East.

In a truly masterful hour-long interview with CNN, the Israeli Prime Minister revealed, without quite explicitly using these words, that Israel has undertaken a series of drone attacks against Iranian weapons facilities.

These attacks are designed both to serve Israel’s interests and to hinder Iran’s ability to supply drones and other weapons to Russia for its use against Ukraine.

Israel faces a period of intensified violence in the Palestinian territories, along with some dangerous internal polarisation, but Netanyahu looks like a politician in the box seat who has faced all these problems before and knows what he’s doing.

CNN’s worldview is left liberal and it’s not remotely sympathetic to Israel, but the condition of the interview was obviously that Netanyahu be allowed a reasonable chance to finish his answers and that the dialogue be polite. TV networks should try this style with subjects they don’t view sympathetically more often.

Netanyahu confronts a sea of troubles. Some nine Palestinians, including one certainly innocent civilian, were killed a recent anti-terror operation in Jenin. Seven innocent Jewish worshippers were murdered in a terrorist attack outside a Jerusalem synagogue and a couple of days later a Palestinian child shot and wounded another group of Jewish Israelis.

Recently 100,000 Israelis protested at Netanyahu’s proposed judicial reforms. And his right-of-centre coalition certainly contains a couple of unsavoury characters.

Netanyahu dealt with all these issues convincingly and pragmatically. He has his pluses and minuses but Israel has never produced a more fluent political leader.

Israel was never more peaceful or safe, Netanyahu pointed out, than in his previous 10 years as PM. There was a marked increase in terrorist incidents in the territories under the previous Government and now something similar was happening in east Jerusalem.

Israel has formally annexed east Jerusalem but Palestinians claim it as their own territory. Most nations regard east Jerusalem’s sovereignty as contested.

Netanyahu was clear that Israeli security forces would increase counter-terrorist operations both in the territories and in east Jerusalem, but this was not, he said, to escalate conflict but to reduce violence.

This image grab taken from a UGC video posted on January 29 reportedly shows an explosion in Iran's Isfahan province.

The Israeli government contains a couple of politicians who can legitimately be called far-right and who have said in the past unacceptable and deeply offensive things.

Netanyahu made three points in response. A lot of people say weird things when they don’t have power but moderate when they do have power. The last Israeli coalition government, notionally of the centre-left, contained a party which owed allegiance to the Muslim Brotherhood. Nobody criticised their presence in the coalition, instead it was seen as a sign of new inclusiveness. Israel’s hyper proportional representation system does make some strange coalitions.

But, Netanyahu said, he has a long record of running coalition governments effectively. He was in charge and his government would not be embracing extremist policies. In this, Netanyahu actually makes a strangely compelling case for his own necessity.

On judicial reform, Netanyahu pointed out his key change is to have governments, with a panel, appoint judges, just as they do in the Australia, the US, Canada, New Zealand, Britain and almost every other democracy. Israel has the peculiar situation in which judges appoint their own successors. Judicial activism has become extreme in Israel and judicial power has become unaccountable. In moving Israel towards common Western practice he was not destroying democracy and he was further open to compromise on the reforms.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has just visited Israel, and while he said the obligatory things about a two-state solution, his visit was one of solidarity with Israel, not opposition to it.

Netanyahu made it clear that the contemporary version of a two-state solution, which he would be prepared to negotiate, must involve Israel retaining security control over the new state. That would not be perfect sovereignty for the new state. But, and here Netanyahu’s point is incontestable, when Israel walked out of Gaza and southern Lebanon it didn’t get peace. Instead the territories became ruled by terrorist groups — Hamas and Hezbollah respectively - — which have fired tens of thousands of rockets at Israel.

His priorities in office, Netanyahu said, are: thwarting Iran’s nuclear weapons program; forging more peace treaties with Israel’s Arab neighbours; and boosting Israel’s already vibrant economy.

That’s a pretty plausible program from a pretty plausible Israeli leader.