Hasan Dajah

Israel’s current crisis is no longer a front-line crisis, a temporary war, or a passing political dispute. Rather, it has transformed into a comprehensive structural impasse affecting the legitimacy of the state, the cohesion of society, the stability of the economy and Israel’s standing in the international system. This impasse does not stem from an “external threat” as much as it is a direct result of the political course chosen by Benjamin Netanyahu’s sixth government, which abandoned the logic of the state in favour of the logic of clinging to power and the strategic vision in favour of managing successive crises with no end in sight. This is gradually leading Israel towards isolation, division and exhaustion, transforming politics from a tool for managing interests into a tool for managing fears, and from a means of building the future into a means of postponing the explosion.

Since the formation of the current government, settlement activity has transformed from a manageable contentious issue into a central policy used to impose irreversible realities. The legalisation of 55 settlement outposts, the approval of nearly 69 new settlements, the promotion of some 30,000 housing units in 2025 alone, and the accelerated construction through the establishment of 144 farms and settlement sites on approximately 1 million dunums are no longer expressions of a security need or even a coherent ideological project. Rather, they have become a political tool to appease the most extreme coalition partners and tie the government's fate to an irreversible course.

This expansion not only deepens the conflict with the Palestinians but also places Israel in open confrontation with international law and growing segments of global public opinion. It transforms the occupation from a temporary situation into a permanent system with no political horizon, leaving the state trapped in managing a conflict that cannot be resolved or ended, and turning military power from a deterrent into a tool of continuous attrition.

At the same time, Israel's international standing is eroding at an accelerating pace. The protracted war in Gaza, with its widespread destruction and profound humanitarian crisis, the obstruction of aid organisations, and the revocation of licences for international institutions that were helping to prevent the complete collapse of civilian life, have all redefined Israel's image in the world. It is no longer seen as a democratic state forced to defend itself, but rather as a power that rejects accountability and attacks all criticism as hostility or an attempt to delegitimise it. This transformation threatens the future of its economic, scientific, and cultural relations and weakens its ability to benefit from globalisation at a time when it is increasingly dependent on foreign markets, investments, and technology, and needs international legitimacy more than ever—legitimacy that cannot be replaced by force.

Domestically, Israel is experiencing one of the deepest divisions in its history. The judicial overhaul, the politicization of state institutions, the ongoing war, exemptions from military service, the unequal distribution of burdens, and the accelerating religionisation of the public sphere have all shattered trust between the state and its citizens and undermined the perception that the law is a unifying framework above politics, not a tool in its hands. The courts, the army, and the civil service are no longer seen as shared institutions representing everyone, but rather as arenas of partisan and identity-based conflict, reshaped according to the balance of power within the coalition, not according to the logic of the public interest. The social contract, founded on the idea of ​​solidarity, shared risk and relative equality before the law, is gradually unraveling and being replaced by an unwritten contract based on privilege, loyalty and alignment.

In this context, the waves of reverse migration cannot be interpreted solely as an economic phenomenon, but as a political and social indicator of eroding faith in the future. According to data from the Central Bureau of Statistics for 2025, 69,300 people left Israel, while only 19,000 returned. Even after adding approximately 24,000 new immigrants, the balance remains negative, with about 20,000 people leaving in a single year. Furthermore, the numbers of new immigrants and family reunification are lower than before, meaning that leaving is not being compensated for by returning. An estimated 1 million Israeli citizens live abroad, many of them from the educated and professional classes that form the backbone of the economy and society. This exodus is not an individual migration, but rather a silent vote against a growing feeling that the state is no longer a unifying project or a stable place to build the future.

At the same time, Benjamin Netanyahu has transformed from a statesman into a hostage of his coalition, his survival contingent on appeasing extremist forces that undermine the independence of the judiciary and entrench permanent control. Politics is thus conducted according to the logic of immediate survival and the mobilization of fear, not the logic of the public interest and building trust.

The result is a state militarily powerful but morally weak, tactically superior but strategically losing, capable of inflicting destruction but incapable of producing a comprehensive political, moral, or social vision. Israel does not face the threat of extinction, but it faces a far deeper danger: the risk of becoming a besieged entity, internationally ostracised, internally divided, relying solely on force to maintain its existence, and gradually losing its true sources of strength: Legitimacy, cohesion, trust, openness and the capacity for internal renewal.

This trajectory does not lead to a sudden, dramatic collapse, but rather to a slow, silent, yet profound erosion. An erosion of the state's image, of its citizens' trust in it, of its standing in the world, and of its ability to be a unifying project rather than merely a machine for managing perpetual conflict. This is the real danger that current government policies are leading to: Not destruction in one fell swoop, but a long decline that eventually makes destruction secondary, because meaning itself has been lost before that.

The author is a professor of Strategic Studies at Al-Hussein Bin Talal University