Israel’s new parliament convened on Tuesday (November 10, 2026) with plans to take aim immediately at caretaker Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as his rival Gadi Eisenkot vowed to quickly cobble together a new government.
Eisenkot’s party announced agreements on key people to replace allies of Mr. Eisenkot’s bloc announced it had the votes to install as parliament speaker Matan Kahana, a former senior military figure who clashed with ultra-Orthodox Jews during a past stint in government. Mr. Eisenkot, leading a broad left-to-right bloc, will control the agenda from the outset in the new parliament with the help of Israeli-Arab parties, although neither he nor the right-wing Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving Prime Minister, hold a majority on their own. President Isaac Herzog, ceremonially opening the session, called on all sides to work together and avoid a fresh election in a deeply polarised country weary from three years of war. Mr. Mr. Liberman has made clear that he will refuse to join a government that relies on Arab-Israelis, even if they stay out of the coalition and prop it up from the outside.
Netanyahu, who has been in and out of office for nearly 20 years. But Eisenkot needs 61 votes — a majority — to become Prime Minister.
“I am committed in this complex situation to form a national-emergency government as quickly as possible,” Eisenkot, a 66-year-old former military chief who only recently entered politics, said before his swearing-in. Arab-Israeli lawmakers said they would support Kahana, all but guaranteeing he will take the helm in the parliament.
Hours before the opening of the Parliament, known as the Knesset, Mr.
