http://www.tomgrossmedia.com/mideastdispatches/archives/001891.html
Today, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faces his biggest political challenge to the leadership of Israel’s ruling Likud party for over a decade, when he will be challenged in a Likud primary leadership contest by Gideon Sa’ar (a former journalist, lawyer and then a government minister). If Netanyahu loses, Sa’ar will likely become interim prime minister.
I attach two pieces below, by Anshel Pfeffer in today’s leading left-wing Israeli paper Haaretz, and by Isabel Kershner in the New York Times, a paper that continues to obsess about Israel and devote enormous amounts of space to scrutinizing the small Jewish state while all but ignoring much of the rest of the world.
Pfeffer is a very knowledgeable journalist though sometimes he allows his disdain for Netanyahu and the Likud to cloud the impartiality of his reporting.
Gideon Sa’ar is unlikely to win today’s vote. However, if he makes a strong challenge, as expected, he will set himself up as the clear favorite to succeed Netanyahu should Netanyahu fail to win the Israeli election on March 2 (the third general election in Israel in less than a year) and Netanyahu is then forced from power. (Sa’ar would likely then form a unity government with Blue and White party leader Benny Gantz.)