Eisenkot calls Netanyahu unity offer spin, says Likud talks already set

Gadi Eisenkot, leader of the Yashar party and the lawmaker currently tasked with forming Israel's next government, on Saturday evening rejected a call by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to open negotiations on a national unity government, calling it "another spin." The Times of Israel reported that Eisenkot said the negotiating teams of Yashar and Netanyahu's Likud party had already arranged to meet the following day, so the invitation offered nothing new.

In a statement posted on X, Eisenkot wrote that Netanyahu knew such a meeting was already on the calendar and described the offer as the latest bluff. He accused Netanyahu of claiming to seek unity while dividing and inciting, and of disgracing a state occasion in the Knesset, Israel's parliament. He added that Netanyahu's tricks would not work on him or on Israel's citizens. Haaretz characterised his response as calling Netanyahu's plea a "bluff" and urging support for Yashar's candidate for Knesset speaker.

The Knesset speaker vote as a test

According to N12 political correspondent Dafna Liel, Eisenkot added in his statement that he expects lawmakers from Likud and from the Religious Zionism party to vote on Tuesday in favour of appointing Matan Kahana as speaker of the Knesset, and that this would be "their test."

The speaker presides over the parliament's plenary sessions and controls much of its agenda, which makes the post an early marker of where a majority lies in a newly elected house. By framing the vote as a test, Eisenkot is presenting it as a way for Netanyahu's allies to show whether their stated interest in unity extends to backing his side's candidate. Religious Zionism is a right wing party that has sat in Netanyahu's governing bloc.

How Israel got here

According to The Times of Israel, the bloc led by Netanyahu fell short of a majority in the Knesset at the election held last month, and President Isaac Herzog handed Eisenkot the mandate to form a government last week. In Israel's system, the president, after consulting the parties elected to the Knesset, assigns one lawmaker the task of assembling a coalition. Until a new government is sworn in, the outgoing prime minister stays on in a caretaker role, which is the position Netanyahu now holds.

The newly elected Knesset, the 26th, held its opening session in Jerusalem on November 10, 2026, according to photo captions published by The Times of Israel and The Jerusalem Post, which described Eisenkot's response as dismissing the unity call as political spin.

Netanyahu has called for a government that would include all of the parties with a Jewish majority, The Times of Israel reported, while continuing to attack his political opponents.

Eisenkot's stated conditions

The Times of Israel reported that Eisenkot has ruled out sitting in any government with Netanyahu himself, but is open in principle to partnering with Likud without Netanyahu, provided the coalition is under Eisenkot's leadership.

In his post on X, Eisenkot said Netanyahu also knows the conditions for joining what he called an emergency government under his leadership, starting with acceptance of principles Eisenkot has laid out. These are Eisenkot's own terms as he described them; no response from Likud to those conditions appears in the reports.

Reaction from the opposing bloc

Before Eisenkot's statement was widely circulated, Ynet reported that a senior figure in what it called the change bloc, the parties opposed to Netanyahu, described the offer as another spin and said Netanyahu was already playing a game of trading blame. Ynet did not name the figure.

The wording varied slightly across outlets. Several Hebrew language reports, including those from N12, News.co.il and the journalist Amit Segal's channel, reproduced the core of Eisenkot's statement: that Netanyahu was calling for talks after they had already been set. English language outlets rendered his description of the offer as "spin," "political spin" or "bluff"; his Hebrew post used both words.

What the reports do not say

None of the reports carry a response from Netanyahu or Likud to Eisenkot's statement, or confirm from Likud's side that a meeting between the negotiating teams has been scheduled. The reports do not specify which Knesset event Eisenkot meant when he accused Netanyahu of disgracing a state occasion. They also do not say whether Likud or Religious Zionism intend to back Matan Kahana in Tuesday's vote, or set out in full the principles Eisenkot says a partner must accept.