ביבי: גאון, לא נדיב ואכזר- על תרגיל וינטר

I wanted to offer some observations to help make sense of the “Ofer Winter phenomenon,” which, in my view, is very much a

product of the Netanyahu workshop — reflecting a level of political sophistication that has no equal in Israel, and perhaps nowhere else.

So who is Ofer Winter?

He is the Ashkenazi copy of Zini. His appeal reaches the knitted-kippa Ashkenazi voters who feel disappointed by Smotrich over the issue of Haredi conscription. For them, the rift with the ultra-Orthodox over the state and its symbols — and the sacrifice made on its behalf — matters more than a few additional settlement outposts, because it touches the root of the ideological argument with the Haredim over the Messiah.

In other words, Winter's appearance on the scene is designed to erase Smotrich. Why would Bibi want to erase Smotrich? More on that shortly. But as a rule, Netanyahu always betrays his own supporters — and if you look around, his fiercest opponents today are precisely the people who were once closest to him.

As a rule, Netanyahu always betrays his own supporters — his fiercest opponents today are precisely the people once closest to him.

Erasing Smotrich is one clear and immediate goal, but there is more to it — it also bites into Bennett's electorate, since Winter is positioned to draw votes from knitted-kippa voters angry at Smotrich over his alliance with the draft-dodging Haredim.

Winter's appearance is also pulling the entire election campaign hard to the right — everyone is already competing over who is more right-wing — but the point of this rightward shift in the narrative is to disqualify not only Mansour Abbas, but Yair Golan as well.

“Unity” — on Netanyahu's terms

Netanyahu is delivering on the slogan of “unity.” The role of the tiny parties that will not cross the electoral threshold is to build the narrative that the right represents unity, while the left represents division — and “unity,” in this context, means a government headed by Netanyahu.

Winter's list represents that “unity.” What's more, Winter's deputy is an Israeli Arab, Yoseph Haddad, who served in the IDF and does hasbara (public-diplomacy) work for Israel around the world. Placing Haddad at the top of Winter's list is meant to undercut the Abbas–Segalovitch connection.

Winter and Haddad were supposed to be among the reserved, safe slots on the Likud list, but Bibi preferred to organize them separately.

How do we know Bibi engineered the Winter phenomenon? Because a while back he came out against him — and even now he warns against him. The purpose is to build Winter's credibility as someone independent of Bibi, not his own creation.

And on the Sephardi side: Ben Gvir

So eliminating Smotrich is one goal, coming from the Ashkenazi side. From the Sephardi side, a parallel move has begun to eliminate Ben Gvir — a harder task, since Ben Gvir has already established himself firmly within Haredi-Sephardi nationalism.

The Ben Gvir phenomenon worries Shas greatly, and Aryeh Deri watches with dread as his voters drift toward Ben Gvir. There is no doubt Deri has shared his concerns with Netanyahu, and Bibi has begun distancing himself from Ben Gvir. Everyone who was photographed with Ben Gvir at the Likud conference in Eilat was registered and pushed aside.

Ben Gvir sensed these winds immediately, and rushed to find his own “Altalena” — and the civil war that was averted back then has now broken out between the message boards of Bibi and Ben Gvir.

A Saudi hand in the background

It is worth noting that there is reportedly a Saudi demand in the background to remove both Smotrich and Ben Gvir from the government — and this apparently also weighs on Netanyahu's own calculations as he engineers their political marginalization.

Where it all points

Through the Winter maneuver, Bibi is laying the groundwork for a “Zionist” coalition — meaning: with the Haredim, and without the Arabs. Faced with a choice between a government backed by the opposition with Arab support, Bibi will force the disqualification of the Arabs, in exchange for pushing aside Smotrich and Ben Gvir in favor of Winter — for a government he himself heads, together with Eizenkot. Yes, Eizenkot — ask Deri, Bennett, Lapid — and without Golan.