Opposition MK Naama Lazimi warned that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu could attempt to challenge the results of the next election if he loses, comparing the risk to the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by supporters of Donald Trump.
The election date has not yet been set, though it is expected around mid-October. But opposition figures say they are not convinced that this week’s 17-hour confrontation with Iran will be the last military escalation before voters go to the polls.
“I think Netanyahu is capable of anything, including starting a war to postpone the election,” Lazimi, a member of The Democrats, said in an interview with Ynet’s weekend supplement. “I think Netanyahu acts out of political motives, but the fact that this question is constantly in the air also says something about the mood in the country, that this man is no longer fit.”
“Even if you support him, you are not sure of his motives,” she said. “For him, everything is a political issue and personal motives, including playing with human life.”
Lazimi accused Netanyahu of placing his own political survival above national security, pointing to the continuing controversy surrounding aides in his office who allegedly worked for Qatar while remaining close to the prime minister.
“This man is truly the greatest cynic we have ever had,” she said. “He puts himself above the state, and that is how he subordinates his entire coalition and government.”
Lazimi also criticized coalition lawmakers who supported a bill to subsidize daycare for ultra-Orthodox men who do not serve in the military, saying some voted for it despite privately opposing it.
“You see people voting according to coalition discipline for something they not only do not believe in, but that is against national security, against IDF soldiers, against the economy,” she said. “But Bibi-ism is above everything. If Netanyahu needs the ultra-Orthodox parties, that comes before the state.”
The opposition lawmaker said Netanyahu’s political survival after the October 7 massacre reflected both his lack of moral responsibility and the opposition’s failure to respond quickly enough.
“The biggest mistake we made, and my greatest pang of conscience, is that we thought Bibi was finished and that there was no chance they could survive such a disaster,” she said. “We should have understood that when you are dealing with a man without restraints, he finds every way to recover, including conspiracies and blackening the entire security establishment, just so blame does not stick to him.”
Lazimi said the anti-Netanyahu bloc should have organized earlier and more tightly after October 7.
“We had to be much more organized as one bloc, in full coordination, without calculating the poll of this week or that week,” she said. “There are ideological gaps between me and many of my partners in the change bloc, but there is also so much agreement on the most basic things, from establishing a state commission of inquiry to equality in the burden of military service.”
Lazimi said she could sit in a coalition with right-wing figures such as former prime minister Naftali Bennett and Avigdor Liberman if the shared goal was to replace Netanyahu’s government and rebuild democratic institutions.
“I am not here to be a purist,” she said. “I am here to protect the country of your children and mine. I do not have the privilege of giving these corrupt Kahanists another term.”
Lazimi argued that Likud is already preparing the ground to challenge the legitimacy of the election process by attacking the Central Elections Committee and its chairman, Supreme Court Justice Noam Sohlberg.
“We have to win by knockout,” she said. “The 61 seats we will get, that is clear to me from the polls, but we need 65. Why? Because then he will not have the ability to do a Capitol Hill. He will not be able to challenge the election results, and then you will see the arrows inside Likud turn against Netanyahu.”
Lazimi said the opposition’s task is to win several seats from the pro-Netanyahu bloc, arguing that some voters who once supported him have not yet “freed themselves from his political grip” even when harmed by his policies.
“I am not saying I will bring all of Bibi’s 20 seats,” she said. “But we as a bloc will bring those extra three or four seats. It will happen.”
She rejected the claim that the left cannot appeal to Likud voters, saying her work on public housing, teachers’ status and early childhood education has already drawn support from communities traditionally identified with the right.
“This is work,” she said. “Anyone who thinks some billboard will make the difference is not in the event.”
Lazimi said the next government should immediately establish a state commission of inquiry into the failures surrounding October 7, pass legislation regulating Basic Laws, stop funding schools that do not teach core curriculum and strengthen the status of legal and democratic gatekeepers.
“These are steps to fortify democracy,” she said.
She also backed party leader Yair Golan’s position that parties in the coalition that governed during the October 7 disaster should not be part of the next government.
“This is not a matter of boycotts,” Lazimi said. “It is a matter of national interest. Those who brought us to the hardest place the country has ever known should not be part of the next government.”