If the new government is voted in on Wednesday, as seems likely, Yesh Atid leader Yair Lapid will be replacing Gabi Ashkenazi as foreign minister.
The differences between the two men are apparent. Ashkenazi spent most of his adult life in the IDF, rising to the rank of chief of staff, and came to the role of foreign minister somewhat by surprise, after Blue and White agreed to a unity coalition with Likud last year.
As could have been expected, he brought a military sensibility to the Foreign Ministry, with a regimented system of managing the ministry’s aims and analyzing its successes and failures. And he tried to use his rough-around-the-edges military persona to his advantage, telling his counterparts around the world that he wasn’t a diplomat and would get straight to the point.
Lapid brings an entirely different background to the job, having worked as a journalist and talk-show host before entering politics. Lapid’s years as a writer and TV presenter made him an excellent communicator and one of the Knesset’s best orators, traits that will serve him well as Israel’s chief diplomat making the country’s case around the world.
In addition, Lapid has been preparing for the job of foreign minister for years. After spending a little over a year as finance minister in 2013-2014, he ended up in the opposition.
Lapid decided to put a greater emphasis on foreign relations, building contacts with and traveling to meet foreign ministers and legislators. In 2016, he accused Sweden’s foreign minister of being an antisemite while speaking at a pro-Israel rally in Stockholm, and in 2017 he led a push with US Rep. Ted Deutch (D-FL) to convince European states to designate Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, something that Ashkenazi picked up years later.
Lapid has kept up his network of international relations, a source close to the Yesh Atid leader said on Sunday, including people like French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, whom he met before they reached their current posts. He is one of the few Israeli politicians to have met with Kamala Harris before she became vice president of the US.
The likely foreign minister’s top priority will be trying to strengthen bipartisan support for Israel, tapping into his relations with Democrats and Republicans in Congress, running the gamut from Lindsey Graham and Tom Cotton to Elizabeth Warren. Yesh Atid’s platform calls to heal rifts between Israel and US Jewry.
The platform also calls for Israel to encourage more active American engagement in the Middle East, an unpopular position in the US in recent years.
“We must bring before the US government a vision of the Middle East led and designed by US allies and not by the radical axis,” the platform states. “In that way, can we bring our powerful ally back to the region and ensure Israeli interests will be expressed everywhere, while progressing towards separation from the Palestinians, which is necessary for our future.”
The platform shows that Lapid sees the Abraham Accords between Israel and four Arab countries as key to a broader regional policy that would also be one of his priorities in office.
The Abraham Accords countries share a goal of “reining in Iranian aggression and defeating radical Islam,” the Yesh Atid platform explains.
A source close to Lapid pushed back against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s claim that the Yesh Atid leader does not oppose the nuclear deal between Iran and world powers. Lapid went to Washington to lobby against the deal in 2015, when it was first authorized, expressing concern that its enforcement mechanisms are not strong enough, and that it did not address conventional Iranian aggression.
At the same time, Lapid was critical of Netanyahu speaking before both houses of Congress in 2015, and he plans to engage differently on the issue in conjunction with expected prime minister Naftali Bennett.
Yesh Atid also views the Abraham Accords as “an opportunity to realize the vision of broad regional support for a two-state solution that will meet the security and diplomatic interests of the State of Israel.” Israeli ties with more countries in the region will “push the Palestinians to abandon their current approach to advance to a path of realistic negotiations.”
Similar to Ashkenazi, Lapid’s support for a two-state solution is unlikely to go farther than statements because of the nature of a left-right unity government, but primarily because of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas's refusal to engage and the PA’s unilateral actions against Israel in international organizations.
On that front, the Yesh Atid platform calls for Israel to have a clear strategy in countering the war crimes charges against Israel in the International Criminal Court, calling for a “diplomatic campaign with countries involved in fighting terror in populated areas.” The campaign would focus on the independence of Israel’s judiciary and legal justifications for Israel’s methods of fighting terrorism.
Lapid has also long criticized Netanyahu for creating or enhancing ministries with responsibilities that overlap with or detract from the Foreign Ministry. For example, there have not been any reports of who will take the Strategic Affairs portfolio, a likely indication that the ministry, which combats delegitimization of Israel, will be folded into the Foreign Ministry in some manner.
The Yesh Atid leader has also called for the Foreign Ministry to have a higher budget over the years, something he will be in a position to attain as head of the largest party in the coalition if a new government is formed this week.