Netanyahu accused of political spin after backing bid to scrap snap elections

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu is backing a plan to cancel a snap election that his party helped to call, in a stunning U-turn critics have dubbed “political spin” to keep himself in power.

Weeks after emerging victorious from the 9 April polls, Mr Netanyahu failed to gather enough seats in the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, to build a government.

His Likud party and their allies took the unprecedented step of dissolving the legislature for the second time in six months in order to stop a rival lawmaker from forming a ruling coalition.

It triggered another election, which was due on 17 September, and plunged the country into an unprecedented political paralysis.

But now party members told The Independent they are backing a suggestion from the parliament’s speaker Yuli Edelstein, also a member of Likud, to undo that decision and go back to the negotiating table.

Critics believe it is because they fear they will not win the forthcoming elections, which the party denies.

A Likud spokesman said if 80 Knesset members back the proposed bill it could be pushed through. It is unclear if it could be overturned by the high court.

“Re-elections after elections is a waste of money and time. Right now we have many challenges in the security arena and the economic field,” Jonathan Orich told The Independent on Wednesday.

“We voted for new elections because we didn’t know there was a way to establish a unity government.”

“If we can cancel the election and establish a government, this is better for everyone,” he added.

He denied claims this proved Mr Netanyahu and his party feared they would lose.

“We are sure the Likud would win and Mr Netanyahu would be able to form a government,” Mr Orich said.

Mr Netanyahu had been campaigning under the shadow of likely indictment in three corruption cases, impacting his popularity. He is due to face a pre-trial hearing in a few months.

On Wednesday, it emerged he had a new powerful elections rival when the former prime minister Ehud Barak announced he had formed a party that would compete in the upcoming polls.

Mr Barak, the ex-leader of the country’s Labour party, said Mr Netanyahu’s ”corrupt” regime must be toppled and described Israel as living in its “darkest time”.

For the first time in Israel’s history, the country is now set to hold two general elections within just a few months.

It comes after Mr Netanyahu failed to form a ruling coalition over a spat with his former defence minister Avigdor Lieberman, who refused to pledge his party’s five parliamentary seats.

Since Mr Netanyahu missed the deadline, the Likud Party tabled a bill calling for new elections to stop the country’s president from tasking a rival lawmaker with forming the government, as is usual practice.

Just a month later the premier appears to be trying to undo that.

The news of the political backtracking comes amid reports that the Likud Party is seeking to build a unity government with their chief rivals the Blue and White party, with little success.

The two parties were neck and neck in the April polls both securing 35 seats each. Together they could easily form a majority in the 120-seat parliament.

Mr Orich said the Likud was interested in joining forces but up until now the other side “had refused if Mr Netanyahu was part of it”.

“There is no chance, no way that Mr Netanyahu would not lead the party,” he added.

On Tuesday, the centrist alliance’s leader Billy Gantz tweeted that Mr Netanyahu was “lying” and there were “no negotiations”.

A day later he said the prime minister “pressed the button to dissolve the Knesset and there was no turning back”.

Calling Mr Netanyahu’s actions “spin” he added: “We are ready [to run in the elections] and we will win.”

Anshel Pfeffer, an Israeli journalist and author of Bibi: The Turbulent Life and Times of Benjamin Netanyahu also called the move to backtrack political spin.

He said the prime minister feared he might face the same problem with Mr Lieberman down the line and so fail to form a government for the second time.

“He has belatedly realised the public is blaming him for an unnecessary second election so he is trying to make it look as if its someone else’s fault,” Mr Pfeffer added.