Eisenkot gets the mandate to form a government. The hard part starts now

President Isaac Herzog has tasked Yashar party leader Gadi Eisenkot with forming a government, formally handing him the mandate and setting in motion what promises to be a difficult coalition-building effort. The nomination comes with a defined timeline, and Eisenkot now faces a series of political challenges before he can present a government to the country.

The picture is complicated in part by the recent reversals of Yisrael Beytenu chairman Avigdor Liberman. In a bombshell announcement, Liberman said he would be open to sitting in a government with ultra-Orthodox parties that oppose universal military service, a stance that sent shockwaves through the political system.

Liberman later clarified that he still seeks mandatory enlistment for all, but his prevarications have injected fresh uncertainty into the coalition calculations. His positioning matters because the question of who joins the next government, and on what terms, will shape Eisenkot's chances of success.

At the same time, Israel's legal and security establishment remains under intense scrutiny. The attorney general said on Sunday that she had not seen anything in the Shin Bet-led investigations of possible election fraud that would "even remotely" influence the outcome of last month's vote.

Despite that assurance, the affair has drawn attention to the conduct of the powerful security agency itself. Times of Israel founding editor David Horovitz, reviewing the developments on the outlet's Daily Briefing podcast, pointed to what he described as the troubling behavior of Shin Bet chief David Zini.

Eisenkot's nomination also lands against a backdrop of unusual strain with Washington. US President Donald Trump recently remarked on what he called a "great dislike" for Israel among American voters, comments that have deepened concerns about the future of the alliance.

Those remarks followed Trump's declared intention last week to cut off the annual near $4 billion in US military aid to Israel within weeks. The statement has raised the question of whether the United States will even continue to sell defense products to Israel in the not-so-distant future.

Away from politics, a recent concert offered a rare note of harmony, with Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood joining Israeli rocker Dudu Tassa for a performance of Arabic music. The evening was marked by warmth both onstage and in the audience, a striking counterpoint to the turmoil elsewhere in the news.