Promises, platitudes and politics is all that is left on offer from Israel’s prime minister.
By David E. Kaplan
The story about the prophet Samuel informing King Saul that his kingdom was being taken away in favor of a more worthy successor, remains a pivotal moment in the biblical narrative about the wisdom of timeous political transition. (Samuel 15 and 16)
Some 3000 years later, this narrative could not be more instructive.
What if Samuel was with us today and like all Israelis on 16 June 2026, who turned on their local TV news channels to hear their prime minister address the nation on Trump’s MoU. (Memorandum of Understanding).
After all, the issue is the number one existential issue facing the nation of Israel.
This is what the prime minister himself believes.
This is what he has been telling us and the world not for years but for decades. On this issue, he prides himself no less a prophet than Samuel.
So, what would Samuel have thought as he looked upon like all of us in disbelief?
What would he have wisely counseled while going about doing God’s work?
After so much war and suffering, did not the people of Israel deserve to hear at least some details from their prime minister to UNDERSTAND what was happening?
Bibi offered anything but UNDERSTANDING!
Well, not quite because we UNDERSTOOD that Bibi was as lost as all of us as the only relevant insight he could share on the MoU was that he did not know yet any details.
He let us know that we knew as much as he did.
Comforting!
As we prepared to watch Bibi’s carefully choreographed address, all were anxious having been subjected to the rumors that the agreement would:
– strengthen Hezbollah
– strengthen Iran and
– weaken Israel.
As we later learned, it did all three, virtually making Lebanon an Iranian protectorate. Bad enough for us in the center of the country but what of our fellow citizens in the north that as The Jerusalem Post editor solemnly writes would mean:
“…the difference between a family returning to Metula, Kiryat Shmona, Minara, Shlomi, or the Galilee, and another year of empty streets, shuttered businesses, improvised schooling and lives lived in suspension.”
Did the prime minister offer to them and the rest of his listening citizenry anything beyond, promises, platitudes and politics?
Like an ailing King Saul this was a failing “King Bibi” and that we, the modern citizens of Israel, needed fresh ideas and fresh leadership.
Displaying disdain for the concerns and anxieties of his people he hardly even addressed the MoU – the number one issue on all viewer’s minds and why they turned on their TVs to watch.
Desperate to hear some straight talk about what the burgeoning deal between the US and Iran would mean for us, all we got as most commentators agree was a superficial “campaign speech” using the platform to highlight Bibi’s military achievements and outlining future political goals.
Clearly, most pressing for Bibi was setting the record straight following a June 2026 interview, when U.S. President Donald Trump publicly questioned whether Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu intended to run in Israel’s upcoming fall elections, remarking “I wonder if Bibi even wants to continue.”
Bibi assured his viewers that he will be running and that “I intend to win.”
Hardly what many wanted to hear!
In a De Gaulle mode of Je suis la France (“I am France”), Bibi believes he is indispensable to Israel – that he embodies the Jewish State.
Having endured two major conflicts with the Iranian regime, spending hours in shelters as Iranian ballistic missiles rained down indiscriminately in attempts to kill as many Israeli civilians as possible, with lives lost, homes destroyed, and nerves frayed, Israelis deserved more.
They did not get it.
Where we did get the truth was from Trump’s former partner- in-chief during his first term, VP Mike Pence who blasted the U.S.-Iran MoU, warning it contains no requirement for Iran to dismantle its nuclear or ballistic missile programs and no commitment to end support for terror groups like Hamas and Hezbollah.
All issues critical to Israel, Pence said the deal would immediately ease sanctions, unlock billions in frozen Iranian assets, and pave the way for hundreds of billions in reconstruction funding for Iran, calling it “the kind of appeasement” seen under previous administrations.
Days later, having time to “digest”, many in Israel felt a need to belch as the final memorandum appeared even worse than the leaked version, strengthening Iran’s hold over Lebanon, ignoring Hezbollah’s disarmament and exposing a seismic gap between Trump’s declarations and the agreement he signed. This deal sounds little more than extortion – paying Iran off to open Hormuz!
While all this is going on and Israelis have made such sacrifices for their families, for their friends and for their country, thousands of Hareidi protestors are blocking highways, attacking Supreme Court Deputy President Justice Noam Sohlberg’s private residence all in support of draft dodgers. What would Samuel say listening to a representative of the Jerusalem Faction protest say:
“We will shut down the country, and anyone who thinks they have seen it all is in for surprises. The struggle is only at its beginning, and our next steps will be far more significant.”
And what is this governments response to this anti-Zionist conduct undermining and dividing the country?
Adding insult to injury, this government under this prime minister is advancing a proposed Basic Law that elevates Torah study to a foundational national value that will define long-term Torah study as equivalent to “meaningful service” in the IDF.
Shame, Shame, Shame.
What would Samuel of 3000 years ago say today?
He would say like most are feeling.
It is time for change.
While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves. LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).
