Netanyahu's Iran Gambit: Can Manufactured Fear Keep a Failing Leader in Power?

Benjamin Netanyahu is now a caretaker prime minister, and by the account of several analysts he is acting like a man looking for a way to stay in the job. His right-wing coalition, which oversaw the war in Gaza, launched attacks across the region and curtailed civil liberties at home, appears to be losing its hold on power. Against that backdrop, reports say Netanyahu has told the Israeli military to prepare for a possible attack on Iran, despite calls for restraint from the opposition.

The reports follow other revelations. Netanyahu has reportedly been phoning US President Donald Trump almost daily to press for renewed strikes on Iran. Israeli media have also described repeated clashes between Netanyahu and military chief Eyal Zamir, who has resisted proposals for action against Iran and warned that they could set off a wider conflict.

The political clock matters here. Opposition leader Gadi Eisenkot has been tasked with forming a viable government, though success is not guaranteed. Netanyahu has pushed for a national unity government that would include himself and his Likud party. Failing that, he could wait for Eisenkot to fail, which would lead to another election. Many in the opposition, Eisenkot among them, accuse Netanyahu of either dragging the country into a potentially devastating war to save himself, or of deliberately stalling coalition talks to run down the clock and force a new vote.

Ahron Bregman, an Israeli political analyst at King's College London, put it bluntly: "Netanyahu is desperate." He argued that Netanyahu's behaviour shows he knows he is likely politically finished, and that only a national unity government could rescue him. In Bregman's words, a little war could compel Eisenkot and his bloc to form such a government in a time of crisis.

The more unsettling argument comes from analysts who think the opposition might go along with it. Haggai Ram, a professor at Ben-Gurion University and author of the book Iranophobia, which traces Israel's long hostility toward Tehran, called the situation paradoxical. Everyone would know a war was contrived, he said, but the hysteria over Iran cuts through everything. If Netanyahu managed to start one, Ram expects the opposition to fall in behind him, and the public to expect it of them. Many opposition figures spent their military careers preparing to confront Iran, and after years of warnings, much of the public already sees war as inevitable.

That sense of inevitability has deep roots. Israel's cold war with Iran has lasted throughout most Israelis' lifetimes. Israelis have lived with the threat of attacks from Iran's regional allies, including Hezbollah in Lebanon, whose rhetoric about Israel's destruction is widely covered in Israeli media. Israeli leaders have warned since at least the 1990s that Tehran was on the verge of acquiring a nuclear weapon and would likely use it. After the Hamas-led attack of October 7, 2023, Israel launched multiple wars across the region. A 12-day exchange of strikes with Iran in June 2025 was followed by a joint attack with the US in February, which has disrupted some of the world's critical waterways, shaken financial markets and raised household costs across much of the world.

Still, political psychologist Daniel Bar-Tal of Tel Aviv University sees another war as a possible exit for Netanyahu. A majority of the public opposes him and his coalition, and he faces multiple active criminal cases. In Bar-Tal's framing, Netanyahu is fighting for his life. Bar-Tal doubted that Trump, Israel's principal ally and military backer, would let Netanyahu derail US negotiations with Iran. But he believed Israelis would still support such a war, and that it would be a good card for Netanyahu to play to create the turmoil he needs.

Ram describes a society in a state of permanent expectation. People know any case for war would be manufactured, he said, and they are not stupid. Yet many, including some of his friends and students, regard it as inevitable. If it comes, he said, they will report for duty and do as ordered.

The questions to watch are whether Eisenkot can assemble a government, whether Trump backs renewed strikes, and whether Zamir's objections hold.