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Netanyahu: 'No Palestinian state. Period.' His terms for a coalition
Six days before Israel's October 27 election, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sits down with The Jerusalem Post at 2:14 a.m. on his 77th birthday.
Netanyahu says Israeli military intelligence and the Mossad have warned that Iran and its proxies are weighing ways to influence the vote.
He describes Operations Rising Lion and Roaring Lion as having done "ninety percent of the job" against Tehran's nuclear and missile programs, and he warns that the regime is trying to rebuild them.
The prime minister addresses President Trump's surprise endorsement, which he says he did not know was coming, and why Vice President JD Vance declined to offer one. On pressure from a potentially less friendly Washington, he is blunt: "If you bow your head, you're dead."
Netanyahu also lays out the four principles he says any coalition partner must accept, starting with no Palestinian state. He calls settler vigilantism "wrong" and damaging to Israel abroad. He repeats his claim that his criminal trial has collapsed and calls for an investigation of the officials who led it.
He traces Qatar's role in what he calls the vilification of Israel to a warning from his late father, historian Benzion Netanyahu, that Jews who are "prominent and weak" invite antisemitism when societies change. He also explains why he sees the race as an even tie, and why he says a right-wing party falling below the electoral threshold, as happened in 1992, could decide the outcome.
His opponents, including main rival Gadi Eisenkot, reject his characterizations of them, and this interview presents the prime minister's case in his own words.
20 Oct 2026
Should you cancel The New York Times? Gil Hoffman says no
Israel recovered fast on the battlefield but kept losing the narrative war, says former HonestReporting executive director Gil Hoffman.
In a wide-ranging conversation with Jerusalem Post senior international affairs correspondent Mathilda Heller, Hoffman discusses his new book, The Blood Libel Machine. He argues that Hamas planned October 7 to shape global public opinion, and that Israel entered the war with no plan for the media front.
"Every day since October 7 has become easier on the military battlefield," he says. "Every day since October 7th has gotten progressively harder" in the narrative war. On Israel's own communications effort, his verdict is blunt: "They really just didn't even try."
Hoffman spent nearly 24 years covering Israeli politics for The Jerusalem Post, and he insists this is not an anti-media book. He discusses the Gaza hospital blast reporting and the reliance on Gaza-based sources. He also covers the role of NGOs and UN bodies, and where bad journalism ends and bias begins.
His practical advice includes arguing with ChatGPT, using community notes, and reading outlets like The New York Times more carefully rather than cancelling them. Ahead of Israel's election, he calls on the next government to treat public diplomacy as seriously as the Iranian nuclear threat. He also faults the current one for leaving key posts empty on October 7, including the English-language spokesperson and the consul general in New York.
19 Oct 2026
Kisch: Netanyahu 'can be the first one to be checked' on October 7
Israel's Education Minister Yoav Kisch says Likud wants an October 7 investigation, just not one appointed by Supreme Court President Yitzhak Amit.
In this Jerusalem Post interview, recorded days before Israel's October 27 election, the senior Likud minister argues that half the country would reject a state commission of inquiry, and proposes instead a bipartisan national committee modeled on the US 9/11 Commission.
"Prime Minister Netanyahu can be the first one to be checked," Kisch says, "but it has to be with a committee that is not biased by any side."
He frames the election as a binary choice between a Netanyahu-led right-wing government and an opposition led by Gadi Eisenkot that, he argues, cannot reach 61 seats without the Arab parties, a claim Eisenkot has rejected.
Kisch also defends his record running Israel's schools through the war, from reopening classes for evacuees within weeks to opening four new medical faculties. He responds to Israel's lowest-ever PISA results, explains how AI-based personal learning will change the teacher's role, and addresses the approval process behind the northern school trip on which a student was killed by unexploded Hezbollah ordnance.
He outlines Likud's coalition red lines, its position on the Haredi draft and core curriculum funding, and why he believes first-time voters shaped by the war will back the right.
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