For Israel’s underdogs, Netanyahu remains king
As Israel's Sept. 17 parliamentary election approaches, a settler, a former ambassador, journalists and a kibbutz member help explain how Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been able to retain his support despite his legal and other problems.
ARIEL, West Bank — On a recent morning in the West Bank settlement of Ariel, Batel Benjamin, a 29-year-old law graduate with a disarming smile, explained her unstinting passion for the country’s longest reigning prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who is fighting to retain his post in the Sept. 17 parliamentary election.
“Ten years ago when we spoke about peace, it meant giving back big chunks of Israel,” she told Al-Monitor during an interview in the single-family home she shares with her husband, parents and four sons. “Under Bibi it is no longer so,” Benjamin said, using the universal nickname for Netanyahu. “For as long as he is the prime minister, I don’t fear that I will be expelled from our land.”
