Opinion | Benjamin Netanyahus Unlikely Hold on Power

Just before Thanksgiving, the International Criminal Court in The Hague issued an unusual set of arrest warrants: one for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, one for his former defense minister Yoav Gallant and one for the deceased Hamas military chief Muhammad Deif.Each man is accused of crimes against humanity and war crimes related to the ongoing conflict in Gaza.The warrant for Mr.

Netanyahu calls for any of the 124 countries that are signatories to the I.C.C.to arrest the Israeli leader should he arrive on their soil.

And yet in Israel, the threat has made only the barest ripple on the domestic front.Israelis seemed far more concerned by how, more than two weeks earlier, on the night of the American election, Mr.

Netanyahu took advantage of a distracted Washington and fired Mr.Gallant, the last remaining political centrist in his cabinet.

Thousands of Israeli protesters took to the streets over the dismissal, blocking a major highway in Tel Aviv with bonfires and shouting, “Bibi is a traitor!”The protests weren’t just about Mr.Gallant, or even the kind of war he led as defense minister.

They were about Mr.Netanyahu himself, a man who has overtly put his own political survival above his nation again and again.

Over the past year, Mr.Netanyahu has risen, phoenixlike, from the political ashes of the nation’s greatest security failure on Oct.

7, 2023, to become a bolder, more aggressive version of himself — a man willing to ignore longtime allies, including many American Jews, brush off international opprobrium and shed a long history of war skepticism in favor of a full-blown, multifront regional war.Hamas, Hezbollah and Syria are now badly damaged.

The last (original) man standing is Mr.Netanyahu, something few would have predicted one year ago.Mr.

Netanyahu managed to wait out the Biden administration’s unsuccessful efforts to bring an end to the war in Gaza, bring home the hostages and curtail civilians’ bloodshed.With Donald Tr...