Many decent people in Israel and around the world are concerned that the decision by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to bring the right-wing Yisrael Beitenu into the government — rather than the center-left Zionist Camp — and to appoint Yisrael Beitenu leader Avigdor Liberman minister of defense will undermine prospects for a peace process between Israel and the Palestinians. They believe the accusation Zionist Camp leader Isaac Herzog hurled at “radical leftists” in his party for allegedly sabotaging a historic opportunity to promote regional peace. They claim that Netanyahu was a stone’s throw from the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative, but as the Americans say, the proof of the pudding is in the eating, and no one is likely to be tasting any of that pudding. On the other hand, Netanyahu has flunked all his previous exams in Regional Peace 101. The grades of deposed Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon weren't any better.

The current political turmoil will not sabotage prospects for peace. The composition of the new government, like that of its predecessor and the one that never materialized with the Zionist Camp, does not change the fact that zero plus zero equals zero. Even the dovish mien that Netanyahu put on for a brief moment will probably not open the public’s eyes to the realization that the king remains a hawk leading them to perdition. For now it would be best to let the United States along with the other members of the Middle East Quartet — the European Union, United Nations and Russia — try their hand at shaking the Israeli public out of its lethargy. All forces of Israeli society, from the enlightened right to the purist left, must be mobilized now to defend democracy.

The first step is to accept that Netanyahu is not going to change. His designated defense minister is not the only one to have honored him with such epithets as “liar” and “crook.” The course of history would have been no different had Netanyahu accepted Herzog’s demand to personally sign off on the agreements they reached in their talks for a diplomatic initiative. What was Netanyahu’s signature worth on the 1998 Wye River Memorandum alongside those of Palestine Liberation Organization Chairman Yasser Arafat and President Bill Clinton? Instead of handing over to the Palestinians parts of Area C in the West Bank, as stipulated by that agreement, Netanyahu transferred (and continues to transfer) the land for the construction of settler homes.

What was the point of Netanyahu’s commitment, while a member of the security cabinet of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, to uproot unauthorized settlement outposts in the West Bank, as laid out in the 2003 road map? Does anyone remember UN Security Council Resolution 1515, unanimously approved at the request of President George W. Bush, to adopt the road map?