Two former Israeli prime ministers join forces against Netanyahu

JERUSALEM (AP) — Two Israeli political heavyweights on Sunday said they would join forces in elections scheduled for later this year in an effort to unseat longtime Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid served as prime ministers in a rotation agreement as part of a coalition government they formed in 2021, ending 12 years of Netanyahu’s rule. Now they plan to merge their parties into single faction headed by Bennett, calling it a partnership between the center and the right.

Bennett said if elected, the new government on its first day would establish a state commission of inquiry into the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel that started the war, an issue that has dogged Netanyahu.

There have been calls in Israel for a public inquiry into the failures around the Oct. 7 attack, the deadliest on Israel in its history.