Once again it has been proved that there is no real substitute, no genuine alternative and no true opposition to Benjamin Netanyahu.
The behavior by the centrist parties throughout the war, including the results of two important votes in the Knesset last week, clearly prove that on the state's fundamental issues which define Israel's character – the occupation, the war, and incredibly, democracy – there are no significant differences among the right, the center and the Zionist left. On these issues we are a state with one voice, one outlook, one opinion: Together we will win.
These things are particularly astonishing in light of the raucous political struggle now raging between the camps. Everyone speaks of a division, a rift, a chasm, when in fact no real differences of opinion exist.
One could think that Israel during war would be a different country were Benny Gantz, Gadi Eisenkot or Yair Lapid to lead it. Absolutely not. Their personal conduct would surely be more upright and humble, but the results would be remarkably similar. Here is the evidence.
In a result that would not shame a Belarusian election – 99-9 – the Knesset supported a government resolution opposing "unilateral" recognition of a Palestinian state. Tempers flared, and hands were raised in overwhelming support of Israeli rejectionism.
The state, whose occupation and settlement policy is the mother of unilateralism, scoffs at the entire world and unites unanimously against a unilateral measure that is ostensibly accepted by half its lawmakers. What a disgrace, albeit not a surprise.
No less predictable was the near-unanimity in the vote to oust MK Ofer Cassif. It doesn't have to do with the Palestinians and the territories, but rather, with democracy, the issue that has stirred the country above all others over the past year.
Israel was divided between democracy's guardians and its destroyers, and in the first test of democracy, it united nearly entirely behind an anti-democratic measure of unparalleled danger. Most of those who fought against the government coup, almost all of those shrieking for democracy, either raised their hand in favor of removing a lawmaker for his opinions and his worldview or fled from the vote in cowardice.
The coup has already won, and this time not only with the votes of the right but also with the votes of Yesh Atid, the National Unity Party and even the Labor Party. The wretched fleeing from the vote by Benny Gantz, Gadi Eisenkot, Yair Lapid, Merav Michaeli and their colleagues was a badge of shame for ones purporting to fight for democracy.
They should have voted no, loud and clear. After all, they know that had the measure succeeded – it was defeated by four votes – it would lead to the removal of all of the Arab lawmakers. And yet they ran away. Another shame, another disgrace for which there is no pardon.
Finally, the behavior in the war: The left and the center supported all of Israel's wars, the just war and the criminal wars, in the beginning. But in the past they soon came to their senses, and there was opposition to every previous war.
Israel's most brutal and most futile war does not have a single voice of opposition in the Knesset, not even after more than four months and almost 30,000 Palestinian deaths, besides the Arab MKs.
Parts of those not on the right support the war from within the government, and another part supports it from the outside, and everyone in the choir sings the same song, conducted by the right. The whole world is calling for an end to the war, and in the Knesset there is not a single Zionist MK who will do so. Democracy? Opposition? Alternative? Not here, not now.
Only the loathing for Netanyahu reminds us that there still remains a coalition and an opposition, but this loathing is mainly personal. He is a liar, he is a hedonist, he is corrupt and thinks only of himself. He forsook the hostages, he sold his soul to the Kahnist right and legitimized it, and perhaps he was always there. All of this is very true and infuriating. But it is not a proposal for an alternative.
It turns out that there is none; together we will win, any moment now.