Gadi Eisenkot challenges Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel’s upcoming elections.
The former army chief leads the Yashar political party.
His policies cover Gaza, Iran, Palestinians and domestic reforms.
Israelis are set to cast their first vote in national elections on October 27, after the Hamas-led attack on October 7, which was followed by widespread destruction in Gaza, which the United Nations called a genocide. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is under great pressure from his opponent, Gadi Eisenkot.
This year’s election is being seen as a referendum on Netanyahu. The election is said to decide the direction where Israel will be heading to. The opinion polls by Channel 12 suggest that this year Netanyahu’s Likud party will trail Gadi Eisenkot’s Yashar party, CNN reported.
The opinion poll is giving 23 seats to Eisenkot’s party and 21 seats to the Likud party in the Knesset of 120 seats, with 61 seats needed for a majority. In the history of Israel, no single party has ever won a straight majority.
Under Israel’s political system, finishing first in an election does not guarantee Eisenkot the chance to form a government. The president gives the task to the lawmaker seen as most likely to build a coalition.
Eisenkot would need support from left-wing, right-wing, and centrist parties. In some cases, he may also need the backing of Arab parties.
Who Is Gadi Eisenkot?
Gadi Eisenkot, 66, the leader of the Yashar party, was born on 19 May 1960. He is the son of Moroccan immigrants. If chosen, he would become the first Prime Minister of Israel from the Mizrahi community.
Eisenkot joined the Golani Brigade in 1978 and eventually rose to become chief of staff in 2015 under Netanyahu, where he worked till 2019. He entered politics in 2022, along with Benny Gantz, another former chief of staff.
In 2023, after the October 7 attacks, he joined Netanyahu’s emergency war cabinet. However, he left the position after 8 months in June 2024, criticising Netanyahu for his failure to achieve the declared targets and the government's inability to govern. His youngest son died in Gaza in a fight.
In the newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth, Eisenkot wrote, “Over Gal’s grave, I swore that the price he paid, he and his friends, those he knew and those he didn’t, would not be in vain.” He has made clear that this promise is at the core of his political campaign.
Eisenkot differs from Netanyahu in his character, style, and approach. His campaign billboards describe him as “a warrior, a leader, a unifier.”
His party is called “Yashar,” which means “straight” in Hebrew. The name draws inspiration from former October 7 hostage Eli Sharabi’s words: “It’s not right, it’s not left, it’s straight.”
What Are The Policies Of Gadi?
On the issue of foreign policy, like his other fellow opponents of the ruling party, Eisenkot is not much different from his opponent Netanyahu. He supports the military operations in Gaza, Lebanon, and Iran that have resulted in a huge number of civilian deaths.
Eisenkot is against the right of Palestinians to have a nation. He has said in an interview to Channel 7 that Israel must heavily control the area between the Jordan River and the sea, referring to strong control over Gaza and the West Bank.
He favours the “Dahiyeh doctrine” that uses overwhelming force against civilian infrastructure in order to create a deterrent against future militant attacks. Gadi is a supporter of Jewish settlements in the West Bank; however, he has opposed the planned E1 settlement block in the West Bank.
Eisenkot has publicly announced that conflict with Iran has not yet finished. He told his supporters during the inauguration of his new party, “Ultimately, it must end in the destruction or dismantling of the Iranian nuclear programme, a goal not yet achieved with 440kg [970lb] of highly enriched uranium already there, which could quickly be turned into several nuclear devices.”
Domestically, he has shown his commitment for investigation into the intelligence failure which resulted into October 7 attacks. Eisenkot has favoured and supported the end of military exemption for the ultraorthodox jews of Israel.
A government led by Eisenkot, without Netanyahu’s far-right allies Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, would likely take a more moderate approach. This could give Trump more room to pursue regional diplomacy, including efforts to achieve Saudi-Israeli normalisation, a long-standing goal.
