Israel's Netanyahu dodges early election as Iran tensions rise

Galit Altstein, Bloomberg News on Jun 12, 2025

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TEL AVIV, Israel — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government survived an attempt by opposition parties to dissolve parliament early Thursday, as tensions spiked over Iran’s nuclear program.

The bill was voted down 61 to 53 after hours of negotiation during which Netanyahu persuaded some ultra-Orthodox allies to stick with him despite their anger over attempts to draft religious men into the military, ending a long-time exemption. Details of the compromise weren’t immediately made available.

In a separate development, the U.S. ordered some staff to depart its embassy in Baghdad and authorized families of military service members to leave the region after Iran threatened to strike American bases if it’s attacked. CBS reported that U.S. officials have been told that Israel is fully ready to launch an operation into Iran.

The two religious parties, United Torah Judaism and Shas, who together hold 18 seats in parliament, are crucial to the survival of Netanyahu’s ruling coalition. While Shas backed the government in the vote, several UTJ members voted against Netanyahu.

If they leave the government, it will still have a majority. A new bill to dissolve parliament can’t be introduced in the next six months, according to the legislative procedures, with a few exceptions.

The leader of the opposition Yair Lapid said after he lost the vote: “When coalitions begin to crumble, they crumble. This is what it looks like when a government begins to die.”

The conscription of ultra-Orthodox men is highly contentious in Israel, particularly as the 20-month war in Gaza takes a toll on tens of thousands of reservists. The army says it needs more boots on the ground and the Supreme Court has ruled the ultra-Orthodox exemption illegal.

The religious parties are seeking to soften and delay any conscription law.

Ahead of the vote Netanyahu and his allies argued that given the crises facing the country, it’s the wrong time to dissolve the government.

“Going to elections now while there are hostages in Gaza and the Iranian issue is coming to a decision would paralyze the country,” Ze’ev Elkin, a member of Netanyahu’s coalition tsaid in a radio interview.

Netanyahu’s government, the most religious and right-wing in the country’s history, doesn’t have to call elections until the autumn of 2026. The prime minister and his allies have lost popularity since the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas attacks and subsequent war in Gaza, and are not projected to win a majority in the next election.

The drafting of Haredi men would relieve much of the pressure on Israel’s reserve forces who’ve been called up for months at a time since the war started — taking a toll on families, businesses and the economy. Polls show a solid majority of the public behind drafting Haredi men.

The religious parties answer to rabbinic authorities who see the matter as existential, and insist their men be allowed to keep studying in seminaries, which they say is as important to winning Israel’s wars as combat. Of Israel’s 10 million population, 1.4 million are Haredi.