First on Fox: Two years since the horrific events of 7 October 2023, when Hamas terrorists attacked Israel and killed 1200 men, women and children before they took 251 others in the Gaza Strip, there is still no hostage agent Deal and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government is confronted with possible investment.
Netanyahu has found an unlikely ally in the former Prime Minister and leader of the opposition, Yair Lapid, who this week has extended a “security network” to the conservative leader in a movement to secure the government if negotiations with Hamas keep going.
The Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin talks to US President Donald Trump during a meeting in the Oval Office of the White House on April 7, 2025 in Washington. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty images)
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De noodzaak van de politieke steun van Lapid komt als rechtse leiders in de coalitie van Netanyahu, minister van Nationale Veiligheid Itamar Ben-Gvir en minister van Financiën Bezalel Smotrich, hebben herhaaldelijk de acceptatie van Netanyahu van president Donald Trump’s vredesplan met Hamas met Hamas met Hamas bekritiseerd en dreigde de coalitie in het laatste jaar op talloze punten te verlaten.
The coalition of Netanyahu lost its majority in the Israeli parliament in July when two ultra -orthodox parties left their ministerial posts after an exemption that reduced a pass for military service.
The movement left the Coalition of Netanyahu for control over only 50 of the 120 seats in the Knesset.
“Now he is completely dependent on the extreme alt-right within his government who says no to a deal [with Hamas]”Lapid explained.
When asked how probably he thought it was that special elections would be activated as soon as the parliament returns from autumn break on October 19, Lapid said: “Most likely.”
It is unlikely that a special election will happen earlier than February or March 2026, Lapid explained, pointing to a designated time frame that makes campaign possible in Israel, should the Knesset cause an early election cycle in November – only seven months earlier than the previously planned elections in October 2026.
Former Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid appeals to the media outside of a polling station in Israel in the coastal town of Tel Aviv in Israel after his vote in the fifth elections of the country in four years on November 1, 2022. (Jack Guez/AFP via Getty images.)
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Lapid believes that the Israeli public would prefer a more central government that would include both the judge and left, a movement that would still give priority to Israeli security, but also ensures that the war in Gaza and repairs are put to the international status of Jerusalem.
“If there is one thing, I regret [it] Is the fact that nobody in the government has the political courage to get up and say … This is a just war, we do what to be done to protect ourselves, but we are sorry for every child who loses his life, “Lapid said.” Children should not die in adults. “
“If Jews, as people, like people who believe in Jewish-Christian traditions and morality, it is heartbreaking,” he added.
Lapid said that this failure of the current government not only led to ambiguity when it came to the strategy of Israel to combat Hamas, it has fueled what he said that media is -forecast and false reporting, and it cost Israel a lot in terms of international support, even among “groups that traditionally supported Israel.”
The opposition leader described a meeting he had with Netanyahu on October 7, 2023, in which he said that the prime minister suddenly seemed “gray and tired and old.”
Protesters hold photos of hostages while marching during a rally in which the Israeli government is called to sign a deal to release the hostages in the Gaza Strip, on 26 August 2025 in Tel Aviv, Israel. (Amir Levy/Getty images)
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“I said something during that meeting that later became a cliché – I said,” Prime Minister, this is the worst day for the Jewish people since the Holocaust.
“What we have to do is form a unity government,” he said. “You have to get rid of the extremists in your government, and we can create a unit of the government because we have to us, a challenge that is unparalleled for everything you or I have ever seen.”
Lapid said that Netanyahu was “reluctant” to follow this route.
“To this day, I am sorry. I thought it was the right thing to do, and I still think it was the right thing to do,” he added.
Netanyahu spent 15 years as the Prime Minister of Israel, who first served from March 2009 to June 2021, before the top track was restored in December 2022.
Lapid described his long term of office as “admirable” and emblematically for his “resilience”.
“But in other ways I can now see, to say politely, the benefits of the two-time limits you have in the United States,” he added.
Families of hostages protest and demand the release of Hamas Captivity in the Gaza Strip, on the Plaza that is known as the hostages in Tel Aviv, Israel, Saturday 2 August 2025. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)
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The opposition leader said that he thinks Israelis is ready for a “unit government” in response to the hard-itight coalition of Netanyahu, and notes that he thinks that the coming elections will be “interesting”.
“It will exceed political lines and it will be based on hope,” he added in reference to the block he is building. “I know it sounds like big words, but I tell you, it’s what we need now.
“It was the most difficult two years of everyone’s life. And the first time in a long, long time, the vulnerability of Israeli society was tangible to us. And we have to rebuild,” Lapid added.
