In a rather dramatic turnaround, Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu has raised the stakes against a key political rival and scuttled efforts to hold early elections that seemed inevitable last week. The upshot is that his government may now remain in power until regularly scheduled elections arrive in November 2019—though his coalition’s thinning 61-59 majority in the 120-member parliament means there are no guarantees it will last that long. Whatever the case, Netanyahu will temporarily serve as defense minister, foreign minister, and prime minister, perhaps the closest Israel has come to a de facto presidential system.

The move came in a nationally televised speech on November 18, when he decided to go over the head of Education Minister Naftali Bennett and appeal to the country and his right-wing base directly. After calling Bennett wrong-headed for threatening to resign unless he received the defense portfolio, Netanyahu proceeded to argue that when right-wing governments were brought down from within during the 1992 and 1999 election cycles, they paved the way for left-wing governments that pursued supposedly inimical policies.

Read more at the Washington Institute.