Blue and right: 6 things to know for April 3

1. Benjamin Erdogan: Blue and White party leader Benny Gantz is leveling devastating criticism at Prime Minister, comparing him to Turkey’s dictatorial president Recep Tayyip Erdogan and claiming that the future of Israeli democracy is at stake in next week’s vote.

• “What we … see is a phenomenon reminiscent of Turkey, where Erdogan is protecting himself from investigations and from other efforts aimed at preventing corruption,” he tells ToI in an interview published Wednesday morning. “You are going to get the Israeli version of the Turkish system. It won’t be the same, it will be something like it. That’s what will happen here.”
• In the interview Gantz pushes his plan to institute a two-term maximum on the premiership, saying that without the limit, Netanyahu has ended up selling the country for his political survival.
• “We replace the chief of staff every four years; does the IDF fall apart?” he asks rhetorically. “Is the role of the prime minister to cultivate political leadership in Israel? My answer is yes. His answer is no, because he thinks you need to cut the head off of any other potential leadership so it doesn’t endanger his own.”
• Gantz also vows to not join a government with Netanyahu, days after a reported recording of him again had him willing to do just that.

2. Partnering with whoever: At a live event Tuesday evening sponsored by the Times of Israel, Gantz told an English-speaking crowd that he would be willing to join up with the ultra-Orthodox, among other things.

• “If we will be the biggest party, we will have a sufficient basis” to form the next government, he said, adding that the assumptions about which parties belong in which political bloc are not necessarily accurate.
• The comments came hours after Haaretz reported that Gantz is planning on trying to forge a quick deal after the election with the ultra-Orthodox, Kulanu and Zehut, which would likely give him enough support to form a coalition.
• According to the report, though, he would only even attempt to the gambit if Blue and White was able to open up a 4-seat lead over Likud.
• Unfortunately for him, a poll by Channel 13 Tuesday night showed him bleeding support, with Blue and White down to Likud 28-29 and Labor up to 14.

3. All the president’s excuses: Channel 12, meanwhile, reported that Netanyahu was worried that without a 4-seat lead over Gantz, President Reuven Rivlin would refuse to give Likud first shot at forming a coalition.

• “Rivlin is just looking for an excuse,” Netanyahu said. “If there is a gap of three, four, five mandates [for Blue and White], [Rivlin] will use this as an excuse, he’ll give [the task of forming a government] to Gantz,” Netanyahu was heard saying, urging Likud voters to quit being apathetic and flock to his side.
• Rivlin, visiting Canada, was not amused, with his office saying that “The president of the country won’t be tempted by flattery and is not afraid of attacks like these, which are repeated irresponsibly and motivated by cynical political considerations.”
• The anti-Rivlin push was especially poorly timed, with it coming just as his wife Nechama was being rushed to the hospital with serious breathing difficulties, just weeks after getting a lung transplant.

4. Gevalt! A poster rally for Sunday night being pushed by Likud mentions Netanyahu and “the right,” without mentioning any specific parties.

• Netanyahu is known for trying in the closing days of campaigns to push right wing voters away from Jewish Home and the like and back into his arms, what is known popularly as the “gevalt,” or “woe is me,” moment.
• The fact that Netanyahu kept making that move was one reason seen behind Naftali Bennett’s decision to split off and create the New Right party, with the idea that he would no longer be taken for granted by the prime minister.
• Nonetheless, most see him as sticking by Netanyahu’s side over Gantz no matter what happens after elections.
• In Yedioth Ahronoth, Yuval Karni calls Bennett’s decision to stand by his man a “great tragedy.”
• “Bennett has claims not only against Netanyahu’s personal behavior, but he also accuses him of failing to safeguard Israel’s security and in wars against Hamas. So why does he go around vowing to recommend Netanyahu. Swallow hard and recommend.”

5. Bot libel: Israel Hayom is continuing to use a report on a fake social media campaign by the Likud to rally its base against “the left” that it says is making the claims.

• In an interview with the paper, Netanyahu mischaracterizes the report as alleging a bot network, and calls it a “blood libel” by Yedioth, which first reported on it.
• “They could not fathom the fact that Likud voters were real people, that they may be independent thinkers. Yedioth does not view them as people. We were once called riffraff or baboons and now people call us bots,” he’s quoted saying in the interview, which will appear in full on Friday.
• As mentioned previously, nobody has claimed the activists were bots, but what was alleged was a concerted, and funded, campaign, which would be need to be reported as such under campaign finance laws.
• At a Central Committee meeting, Likud’s social media coordinator denies any connection to the network and the party’s lawyer calls the claims “total McCarthyism.”

6. Spinning bots into gold: In Haaretz, Yossi Verter writes that Netanyahu’s use of the so-called bot report as a cudgel against his enemies proves his worth as a political Rumpelstiltskin.

• “There is no lemon that he cannot turn into lemonade; there is no garbage he cannot recycle into gold. With fake social media accounts or without them, polls show he is getting closer to a fifth term as prime minister,” he writes.