Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has managed to wring another three to 10 months out of his coalition partners until elections have to be held. The question is: What is Netanyahu's government going to do with that extra time? How will it justify its extension? What additional achievements will it be able to present to the Israeli public when asking for a renewed mandate in 2019?
Here are eight policy initiatives for Netanyahu to consider:
1. Restore Israeli deterrence.
Whether on the southern border with Gaza against Hamas or across the northern borders against Hezbollah and the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, Netanyahu's government must act to restore Israeli deterrence. This means zero tolerance for border rushes, booby traps on the fence, missile fire, incendiary kites and the like. It means targeting Hamas leaders if they fail to cease fire and striking deep inside Syria the minute IRGC bases are identified.
2. Build, build, build.
It is time to buttress Israel's hold on the Jerusalem area and the Jaffa-to-Jericho arc of settlement through significant home construction.
As former Prime Ministers David Ben-Gurion and Yitzhak Rabin understood well, and as Netanyahu does too, Jerusalem is the key to the Jewish people's claim in its historic homeland.
Most urgently, this means massive building in the northern Jerusalem neighborhood of Atarot and in the southern Givat Hamatos area, especially in the E1 corridor between Jerusalem and Maaleh Adumim. All such building plans were frozen throughout the Obama years and since, but Israel should be building 50,000 apartments in these strategic sectors.
Netanyahu should swiftly reach understandings with the Trump administration that give Israel diplomatic backing for a real start on building in these critical areas.
3. Raze Khan al-Ahmar.
The illegal Bedouin encampment was erected in E1 to deliberately challenge Israeli control of the Jerusalem area, and this is exactly why it must be dismantled. Even the less-than-right-wing Israeli Supreme Court has approved the plan to move the Bedouin elsewhere, so no European Union protests or International Criminal Court threats should dissuade the government from acting forthwith.
4. Settle the Golan Heights.
Since it is clear Israel will hold the Golan Heights in perpetuity – there is no unified Syrian state with any moral or political claim on the strategic plateau – the government should adopt an aggressive investment plan for the area. It should double or triple the number of Israelis living there, as well as incentivize businesses to move there.
5. Expand civil defense preparedness.
A big war with the Iranians entrenching themselves in Syria is coming, and the IDF will sooner or later have to act to degrade Hamas and Hezbollah military capabilities too. This means that many enemy missiles will fall upon Israel's homefront, no matter how many Iron Dome and David's Sling batteries the IDF can deploy.
The public must be able to protect itself in fortified shelters, and Israel's critical institutions, from hospitals to power stations, must be similarly well-protected.
Yet anybody who has read recent IDF and state comptroller reports knows that the country is far from ready for this. The Netanyahu government should plan and announce a multi-billion-shekel plan for civil defense preparedness, and quickly invest in bomb shelter construction in poorer neighborhoods of the south and north.
6. Expel U.N. agencies from Jerusalem and Hebron.
Hostile U.N. agencies sit on prime Jerusalem real estate on Ammunition Hill and Armon Hanatziv in Jerusalem – including the very problematic U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East and the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. It is time to give these agencies the boot, and to end UNRWA educational programs in eastern Jerusalem schools too. (The enormous campus occupied by the United Nations high up on the "Hill of Evil Counsel" in Armon Hanatziv would make for magnificent embassy properties for several pro-Israel Western countries).
The so-called Temporary International Presence in Hebron should be expelled too. These supposedly neutral observers from Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Switzerland, Italy, and Turkey have become virulently one-sided, pro-Palestinian actors; permanent provocateurs, not temporary peace-keepers. They should go too.
7. Pass the override law.
Although this may be impossible with the current 61-seat coalition, the government should nevertheless try to pass the Supreme Court override bill being advanced by Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked. This is meant to redress the imbalance of power that has developed between the judiciary and the legislative branches of government.
Supreme Court justices should not have the final say in matters of policy, and certainly not when the Knesset repeatedly and overwhelmingly votes to advance national diplomatic and defense measures – such as migrant expulsion laws or ultra-Orthodox draft rules – despite the court's displeasure.
8. Obtain world recognition of Jerusalem and Israel.
It would be great to see other countries follow the U.S. lead and move their embassies to Jerusalem. It would also be important for one of the Persian Gulf states to welcome a quasi-permanent Israeli economic or diplomatic delegation.
If Netanyahu can pull this off, he will have strong evidence to back up his claim that "Israel's diplomatic relations have never been better."
