Two months to the day after October 7, 2023, a 25-year-old computer science undergraduate and reservist paratrooper called Gal Eisenkot was on a mission to retrieve the bodies of two Israeli hostages from the rubble of a building in northern Gaza.
asserted
undergraduate → call → Gaza
As he explored the site, a Hamas booby-trap exploded in a tunnel shaft and, critically injured, he was evacuated by helicopter to hospital, where he died.
asserted
he → explore → hospital
Just a few miles away, his father, General Gadi Eisenkot, a heavyset career soldier who had risen to the top of the Israel Defence Forces, was in the operations room at the command base of the IDF's 162nd Division.
asserted
who → rise → Division
A shaken officer asked Eisenkot to step outside.
asserted
officer → ask → Eisenkot
'I understood immediately,' the father-of-five recalled later.
asserted
father → understand → five
Going into 'autopilot', he went home and found his wife, Hannah, putting their granddaughter to sleep.
asserted
wife → go → sleep
He gathered his family around him and told them that his youngest son had died.
asserted
son → gather → them
The following day, he was informed that his nephew, Sergeant Maor Cohen Eisenkot, had also lost his life in an explosion in Gaza.
asserted
nephew → inform → Gaza
Yet five days later, while still observing the traditional seven-day 'shiva' period of Jewish mourning, Eisenkot was to be found at a meeting of the war cabinet at the Kirya military headquarters in Tel Aviv.
asserted
Eisenkot → observe → Aviv
'Don't make allowances for me,' he told his dumbfounded colleagues.
asserted
he → make → colleagues
'Because I don't intend to make allowances for myself.
asserted
I → intend → myself
Eleven months later, another nephew, Captain Yogev Pazy, was shot by a jihadi while protecting a wounded colleague, yards from where Gal had been killed.
asserted
Gal → shoot → colleague
Few men in public life have paid such a price for their country and, when Eisenkot resigned from the government in 2024 and went on to set up a new political party called Yashar, or 'Straight', he attracted a groundswell of support.
asserted
he → pay → support
Gadi Eisenkot with son, 25-year-old computer science undergraduate and reservist paratrooper, Gal Meir Eisenkot, who was killed in battle in the north of the Gaza Strip
But outside Israel, few have heard of Eisenkot.
asserted
few → kill → Eisenkot
That is about to change.
asserted
That → change → ?
For the 66-year-old, whose coalition of four Jewish opposition parties won 48 seats in Israel's 120-seat parliament in last month's election, was invited by President Isaac Herzog on Saturday to attempt to form a government.
asserted
coalition → win → government
So what do we know about the politician who now has a real chance of calling time on nearly 20 years of the Netanyahu era?
asserted
who → know → era
Eisenkot's story begins a long way from the corridors of power.
asserted
story → begin → power
He was born of Jewish Moroccan immigrants on the Sea of Galilee in northern Israel in 1960.
asserted
He → bear → 1960
When a baby, the family moved to Eilat, a working-class town in Israel's arid southernmost tip, and his father worked in the copper mines of the Timna Valley.
asserted
father → move → Valley
Eisenkot met his wife, Hannah, at high school at a sailing club and went on to pursue maritime and mechanical studies.
asserted
Eisenkot → meet → studies
If Eisenkot wins, he will be Israel's first prime minister from the 'Mizrahi' community, the Jews whose families were expelled from Arab lands, and who are often patronised by the European-dominated Israeli establishment.
asserted
who → win → establishment
But Eisenkot was a born fighter.
asserted
Eisenkot → bear → ?
At 18, he was drafted into the Golani Brigade, Israel's legendary working man's infantry unit, the start of a military career that would last 41 years.
asserted
that → draft → career
By the time the 1982 Lebanon War broke out he was a company commander and spent years locked in combat with Hezbollah guerrillas.
asserted
he → break → guerrillas
Jake Wallis Simons says like other opposition figures, Eisenkot criticises Netanyahu's conduct of the war in Iran only because it was not decisive enough
He went on to serve as military secretary to two prime ministers and commanded troops in the West Bank at the height of the Second Intifada.
asserted
He → say → Intifada
In 2006, he was put in charge of the northern front.
asserted
he → put → front
It was there that he devised the 'Dahiya doctrine', named after the Hezbollah stronghold in Beirut that was flattened during the war.
asserted
that → devise → war
Any village from which Israel was attacked, he warned, would be hit with massive force.
asserted
he → attack → force
'From our standpoint,' he said, 'these are not civilian villages, they are military bases.'
asserted
they → say → standpoint
In 2015, Netanyahu appointed him chief of staff of the IDF.
asserted
Netanyahu → appoint → IDF
Like other opposition figures, Eisenkot criticises Netanyahu's conduct of the war in Iran only because it was not decisive enough.
asserted
it → criticise → Iran
An Eisenkot government would likely introduce four key changes.
asserted
government → introduce → changes
Firstly, the far-Right ideologues in Netanyahu's government, Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, would probably be out, which would mean a clampdown on settler violence in the West Bank and less discrimination against Arab Israelis.
asserted
which → mean → Israelis
Secondly, the ultra-Orthodox, who have been exempted from military service since the foundation of the state of Israel in 1948 to allow them to devote themselves to studying the Jewish holy book the Torah, would likely be forced to serve in the army.
asserted
them → exempt → army
Thirdly, there would be an inquiry into October 7, which Netanyahu – who continues to duck responsibility for intelligence failures – resists.
asserted
who → continue → failures
And lastly, it would mean an end to a corrosive fight between the far-Right government and the country's judiciary.
asserted
it → mean → government
Ultimately, a government under Eisenkot that excluded Netanyahu would represent a victory for secularism and democracy and a defeat for the cheerleaders of theocracy.
asserted
that → exclude → theocracy
But Britain's Labour Government would find itself dealing with a highly decorated general who is just as hawkish on defence as his predecessor.
asserted
who → find → predecessor
All the main options for coalition have been ruled out by key members of the Eisenkot bloc, meaning any government led by him would have to appeal to either Israel's two Arab parties for support or the two ultra-Orthodox parties.
asserted
government → rule → support
…and 3 more, not listed.
The Aporia
