One of Israel’s most important election cycles is underway. Opposition parties see a rare chance to oust Benjamin Netanyahu, the country’s longest-serving prime minister, who now heads the most right-wing coalition in Israeli history. Amid the echoes of the wars in Iran, Gaza, and Lebanon, Israeli voters’ choices may shape their country—and the Middle East—for decades to come.

This will be Israel’s first election since Hamas’s October 7, 2023, assault, Israel’s subsequent wars against Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the 2025 and 2026 Iran wars. Netanyahu’s supporters say he deserves reelection for leading Israeli successes on several military fronts since October 7th, including fighting shoulder-to-shoulder with the U.S. against Iran. Yet Israelis will vote as their country has become increasingly isolated, including a striking plunge in Israel’s standing in U.S. public-opinion polls. Israelis are also arguing about an independent investigation into the failures of October 7th, rising settler violence in the West Bank, drafting ultra-Orthodox Israelis to serve in the country’s military, and Netanyahu’s ongoing push to slash the power of the Israeli judiciary. Could the 2026 elections be Netanyahu’s last stand?

Host David Makovsky sits down with two veteran Israeli journalists, Gili Cohen and David Horovitz, to understand how Israel’s looming elections will shape the country’s politics and policies.

Gili Cohen covers the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office for Kann News, an arm of the Israeli Public Broadcasting Corporation.

David Horovitz is the founding editor of The Times of Israel.

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Lebanon and Israel held diplomatic talks for the first time in decades after Israel's months-long campaign against Hezbollah. But the ceasefire is shaky: Israel displaced close to a million Lebanese civilians amid fighting with Hezbollah and northern Israelis, with memories of weeks in bomb shelters, fear returning to normal life with Hezbollah still armed.

Host David Makovsky sits down in back-to-back conversations with Lebanese lawmaker Fouad Makhzoumi, Israeli analyst Sarit Zehavi, and Middle East expert Robert Satloff to unpack what’s at stake--and what’s possible-- in Lebanon.

Fouad Makhzoumi is a leading Lebanese member of parliament representing many Sunnis in Beirut.

Dr. Robert Satloff is the Segal Executive Director of The Washington Institute, an independent, nonpartisan Middle East policy think tank.

Sarit Zehavi is the founder and president of Alma, an Israeli institute specializing in security challenges along the Lebanese border. She served for 15 years in the Israeli military's Intelligence Corps and later with its Northern Command.

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After nearly six weeks of war, the U.S. and Iran agreed on April 8 to a fragile two-week ceasefire. But Vice President JD Vance left Pakistan Sunday after 21 hours of high-level talks with the Iranians without making progress toward a deal to end the war. President Trump then threatened to blockade the Strait of Hormuz, the key oil-shipping route that Iran has throttled. However uncertain the road ahead may be, one thing is increasingly clear: in a postwar Iran, the hard-line Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps looks set to further dominate the regime’s complex policymaking structure. Host David Makovsky sits down with two leading Iran experts, Suzanne Maloney and Raz Zimmt, to explore how decisions may be made in Tehran during the ceasefire and beyond.

Dr. Suzanne Maloney is vice president and director of the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution in Washington and a former member of the State Department's Policy Planning staff.

Dr. Raz Zimmt is the director of the Iran and the Shiite axis research program at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv, Israel.

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