How Netanyahu hopes to secure re-election

The general elections in Israel, due in two months, took their first toll this week when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered a new escalation on the Golan front, ordering an Apache to shoot two missiles at a reconnaissance mission organised by Iranian and Hizbollah special forces experts, which killed 12.

Patrolling the armistice lines has been part of a tacit agreement by all operatives there, be they Israeli, Syrian or even Jabhat Al Nusra.

It was known two hours in advance that a general from the Iranian Revolutionary Guards would be on his way to the Golan Heights, along with Abu Ali Tabatabai, Hizbollah’s special forces commander, and other senior Hizbollah fighters, including Jihad Imad Mughnieh who took over his father’s external field operations dossier, following his assassination seven years ago.

When tension, fear and anxiety are maximised, weeks before an election campaign, the ruling party always guarantees that citizens’ votes will be in its favour, since masses psychologically rally behind a symbol of authority and power.

That is Netanyahu’s stratagem now on the Golan.

The inherent message of the Golan shooting did not target the Iranians or to the Syrians.

It is true that the 30,000 Hizbollah fighters were in full alert along all lines overlooking Israel. It is also true Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah threatened to shower Jewish villages with newly acquired Shihab missiles.

Even highest echelon Iranians warned during the Tehran funeral of severe revenge for the IRGC general and the other six high-ranking operatives.

Still, Nasrallah will not launch his missiles against Israeli targets now, just as he did not fire a single shot when Israeli air force hit the convoys of sophisticated weapons and artillery heading from Damascus to Lebanon nine times in the past, the last time in March 2014, when his fighters in charge of the Golan command were killed in what came to be known as the Har Dove skirmishes.

Israel is aware of the great moral and international damage it suffered following its aggression on Gaza last year.

So it cannot run the risk of attacking Lebanese villages, nor can it afford to occupy new territory.

But keeping the Israeli public in a state of suspense and listening to the loud threats of ayatollahs will guarantee a major election victory for Netanyahu for the fourth term, a feat only achieved by David Ben Gurion.

It is all integral part of a new style of election campaign.