For weeks, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has overseen artillery strikes against Hezbollah positions in southern Lebanon, targeted operations in Gaza resulting in more than 20 casualties, and an airstrike on an air base in northern Syria—viewed as a warning to Turkey.
He has also faced criticism for failing to address settler violence in the West Bank, which his own military leaders have cautioned could provoke renewed Palestinian unrest.
The intensification of hostilities across multiple regions is placing significant strain on an armed forces already stretched thin after nearly three years of sustained conflict, not to mention a population still grappling with its effects.
Despite the legitimate security justifications for Israel’s actions, Netanyahu’s own political calculations appear to be influencing the approach.
The Israeli prime minister faces re-election on October 27 and is currently lagging in public opinion surveys, with opposition figures nearly securing sufficient support to unseat him and his coalition.
Both allies and critics are challenging him from the right on security matters, prompting him to adopt an increasingly aggressive stance. Nevertheless, his principal challenger, former army chief of staff Gadi Eisenkot, currently leads Netanyahu in voter trust regarding security leadership. This reflects the lingering impact of Netanyahu’s tenure during Hamas’s devastating October 2023 attack on Israel.
However, incumbency at this critical juncture offers one distinct advantage: the rally-around-the-flag phenomenon.
“Netanyahu wants to light every front on fire, because it positions him as Mr. Security,” said Shira Efron, an Israeli analyst at the RAND Corporation.
“But it also helps him deflect from the failures of Oct. 7 and the last three or four years in office, because the conversation will be about the security situation and not the damage his government brought on Israel,” Ms. Efron added.
Indeed, Netanyahu appears to be deliberately leveraging regional tensions for political benefit. In a video posted on Tuesday, he claimed that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas “wants me to lose the elections.”
“The ayatollahs want me to lose the elections,” he continued, smiling. “Hezbollah and Hamas want me to lose. Turkey does too, by the way. They say this openly. Ask yourselves, who do Israel’s enemies want to win these elections?”
Israeli pollsters suggest that if national security dominates voters’ concerns on Election Day, it could translate to as many as three parliamentary seats for his Likud party. This might be sufficient to prevent the opposition from securing a majority, potentially keeping Netanyahu in power until another election can be called.
One significant obstacle stands between Netanyahu and the national-security emergency that could benefit his campaign. In nearly every conflict zone, Israel’s most critical ally, the United States, is urging restraint.
Israel has been prevented from confronting Iran directly, as President Trump is currently relying on economic sanctions rather than military action. In southern Lebanon, Israel is engaged in gradual political negotiations mediated by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, during which it has agreed to provide the Lebanese military time to remove Hezbollah forces and assume security responsibilities in specific areas near the Israeli border.
In Syria, far from posing an immediate threat to Israel, the government of President Ahmed al-Sharaa has sought American assistance to negotiate a security arrangement with Jerusalem that could potentially lead to Israeli troop withdrawal from the buffer zone.
In the West Bank, where violent Israeli settlers and some soldiers have been harassing, attacking, and displacing Palestinian civilians, Israel’s government has faced pressure from U.S. Ambassador Mike Huckabee—typically an ally of settlers—to control what he termed “Israeli terrorists.”
In Gaza, Israel’s options have been constrained by Mr. Trump’s Board of Peace, an entity largely overseen by Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law and unofficial Middle East project manager.
In July, the board secured Hamas’s first agreement to a comprehensive disarmament plan. Israel rejected it and ordered renewed strikes in Gaza. On August 26, the board’s high representative for Gaza, Nickolay Mladenov, condemned Israel’s strikes in a U.N. Security Council address, stating they achieved little and only postponed Gaza’s demilitarization.
Nimrod Novik, a former foreign diplomatic adviser and envoy for Shimon Peres—the leader Netanyahu defeated to become prime minister in 1996—suggested that Netanyahu appears to be searching unsuccessfully for a conflict he could escalate without American interference.
“It’s like a thief in a hotel—you try every door to find out which one will open,” he observed. “Which is the point of least resistance by the Trump administration?”
Not only left-leaning Israelis perceived potential political motivations. In a podcast interview following the attack, Tom Barrack, the U.S. ambassador to Turkey and special presidential envoy to Syria, mentioned that “one theory” for Israel’s action was as a “well-received pre-election concept.” Mr. Barrack did not respond to requests for comment.
Israeli officials described the attack on the Abu al-Duhur air base as a warning to Ankara against establishing its own military presence at the site. A Turkish delegation had recently visited the airfield in Idlib Province as part of rehabilitation discussions, according to two Syrian officials. Israel claimed that Syria planned to permit Turkish troop deployment there, and that “Syria chose to ignore” Israel’s warnings.
Israeli experts noted that the primary threat to Israel could emerge if Turkey installed air defense systems at the base that could endanger Israeli aircraft operating in Syrian airspace. Israel has utilized Syria as a crucial corridor for attacks on Iran. The Syrian government has protested Israeli “violations of Syrian airspace.”
Notably absent from Israeli messaging was any acknowledgment of Syria’s own prerogatives or that Israel had violated its sovereignty. Instead, Israel appeared to treat Syrian airspace as another Israeli buffer zone—similar to the 400 square kilometers of land in southern Syria that Israeli forces already occupy as a forward defense of their border.
Israel’s statements operated on two different frequencies. For international audiences, Netanyahu’s office stated in English that Israel simply sought to restore the “status quo” between itself and Syria.
For domestic consumption, however, the Israeli leader posted a Hebrew-language video with a more aggressive tone, as if his saber-rattling targeted Ankara. “We will not tolerate the establishment of a Turkish military presence that extends southward, because it threatens us,” he said, adding: “We’ve conveyed the message. How shall I put this message? ‘Don’t.'”
That final word, which Netanyahu pronounced in English, carries particular resonance in the Middle East. It was notably used by then-President Joseph R. Biden in October 2023, a week into the Israel-Hamas war, when he warned Hezbollah and Iran against joining the fight against Israel. “Don’t,” Mr. Biden said on “60 Minutes,” adding: “Don’t, don’t, don’t.”
For Netanyahu to issue a similar warning regarding Turkey was concerning, said Gallia Lindenstrauss, an expert on Israeli-Turkish relations at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv.
“He’s presenting to the Israeli public that Israel has unlimited power, and that’s very dangerous,” she observed.
Talking tough to Turkey differs significantly from confronting Hamas, Hezbollah, or Syria. Turkey possesses NATO’s second-largest military, and its president is a close ally of Mr. Trump.
Turkey also had reason to expect Israeli deference rather than a sudden airstrike near its border, Ms. Lindenstrauss noted: “Northern Syria is an area where in the balance of interests, Turkey’s are greater than Israel’s.”
Nevertheless, she added, judging from Turkish media coverage, Ankara does not appear to take Netanyahu’s warnings too seriously as a military confrontation threat, at least for now.
“Luckily,” she said, “Turkey is understanding this Israeli action as part of Netanyahu’s political campaign.”
