Who is who in the new Israeli government?

The new Israeli government, which except for some last minute change will be ratified today by Parliament, will have two prime ministers and will be made up of eight different parties, belonging to almost the entire political spectrum.

Although for many the focus is placed on the outgoing government, especially the hitherto prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, the incoming Executive has a list of members that stands out not only for its trajectory but also for its ideological diversity.

To begin with, the post of prime minister will be held for the first two years by Naftali Benet, a successful businessman turned settler leader, who comes to power with an ultranationalist and religious agenda, neoconservative politically and neoliberal economically.

In 2023, Benet, leader of the Yamina party, will be replaced by Yair Lapid, a former journalist who heads the Yesh Atid formation and presents himself as a secular centrist, with progressive overtones and a conciliatory discourse between the different parts of an increasingly Israeli society. fragmented.

Both will also rotate the Foreign Ministry, a sign of the new government’s vocation to rebuild Israel’s image in the international arena, where at the moment its main allies are leaders of the extreme right.

Defense Minister will remain Beny Gantz, from Blue and White, who also defines himself as a centrist, who led the military campaign against the Palestinian militias in Gaza last month and who in the last two years came close to dethroning Netanyahu.

The far-right secular Avigdor Lieberman, leader of the Israel Nuestro Hogar formation and former Defense Minister, will occupy the Finance portfolio.

Born in the former Soviet Union, this veteran politician was part of Netanyahu’s Likud in the late 1990s and played a key role in the dissolution of the last stable government in Israel, in late 2018 and due to a dispute over the recruitment of ultra-Orthodox Jews for military service.

The Justice portfolio will be occupied by the right-wing Guideon Saar, from the Nueva Esperanza party and another former associate of Netanyahu, together with whom in recent years he incessantly attacked multiple justice institutions, including the Supreme Court and the attorney general.

However, it is not only right-wing and centrist parties that make up the new government. While the leftist Meretz and the center-left Labor Party will also have portfolios, the Islamist Raam party, whose inclusion in the coalition is historic, will have important positions on different committees.

Nitzán Horowitz, another former journalist and leader of the pacifist Meretz, will be the new Minister of Health, while his number two, Tamar Zandbger, will occupy that of Environmental Protection.

The Labor Party will also have some important portfolios, including that of Transportation, headed by its leader, the feminist Merav Michaeli, and that of Homeland Security, which will be held by Omer Bar-Lev.