Who is Gadi Eisenkot, the retired general who lost a son in Gaza and is challenging Netanyahu in the first elections in Israel since the October 7 attack

Image source, BBC/Getty ImagesCaption, Gadi Eisenkot (left) is posing an unexpected challenge to Benjamin Netanyahu (right), the man who has led Israel for most of the past three decades. Author, Fernando DuarteAuthor title, BBC World ServicePublication date 36 minutesReading time: 9 minIsraeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu could struggle to stay in power after this Tuesday's October 27 elections. Polls indicate that the coalition of Likud (Netanyahu's party) with the far right and ultra-Orthodox parties might not reach a sufficient majority. One of the reasons is Gadi Eisenkot, former chief of staff of the Israeli army, aged 66, who is posing an unexpected challenge to the man who has ruled Israel for most of the past three decades. Relatively new to politics, Eisenkot became a member of the Knesset (Israeli parliament) in 2022 with the National Unity party, which he later left citing ideological differences. Last year he broke with other opposition figures to form his own centrist party, Yashar (meaning "straight" or "upright"), and has managed to become Netanyahu's main electoral rival, a prime minister who in recent years has been plagued by corruption accusations —which he denies— and criticism of his handling of the Hamas attacks of October 7, 2023, to which is added the controversy over his plan to reform the judiciary, which sparked major protests in Israel. Eisenkot decided to run against Netanyahu moved, among other reasons, by the tragedy he experienced. The youngest of his five children, Gal, an army sergeant major, died in December 2023 in an explosion in northern Gaza while taking part in a mission to recover the remains of two Israeli hostages captured by Hamas on October 7. Image source, ReutersCaption, Eisenkot's youngest son, Gal, died in combat while serving in the Israeli army in Gaza in 2023. Eisenkot says he still has not been able to look at his son's belongings, which were given to him in a couple of boxes he keeps at his home in Herzliya, a prosperous coastal city north of Tel Aviv. Skip Most read and continue readingMost readEnd of Most read"I still haven't opened them. I keep putting it off," he told Israeli public radio Kan Reshet Bet in April. Gal's death, as well as the loss of two nephews in the Gaza campaign, along with his view that Netanyahu's government failed to prevent Hamas's unprecedented attacks, drive Eisenkot's political ambitions."I can't turn back time," he told The Times of Israel newspaper earlier this month. "I will do everything I can to live up to the high price Gal paid." Eisenkot says he wants Netanyahu and his cabinet to take responsibility for their handling of the October 7 attacks. Eisenkot joined the war cabinet that the prime minister formed after the attacks along with other opposition figures in a gesture of national unity. But in June 2024 he resigned and accused Netanyahu of not acting quickly enough to secure the release of the hostages taken by Hamas."During his tenure, women and children were kidnapped, he deliberately refrained from doing what was necessary to rescue the hostages," he said, a claim Netanyahu has repeatedly rejected. Image source, Getty ImagesCaption, Eisenkot (right) served as chief of staff of the army from 2015 to 2019 under a Netanyahu government. Netanyahu claims that Eisenkot, as a cabinet member, opposed key military maneuvers in Gaza. "I remember what Gadi Eisenkot and others said when we were still in Gaza... They said we should simply make a deal, bring the hostages back and leave Gaza," Netanyahu said at a press conference in June. According to Netanyahu, Eisenkot's strategy would have prevented weakening Hamas and all its leaders "would still be there, alive and in power." Eisenkot denies Netanyahu's comments and asks him to make public the minutes of the war cabinet's meetings and votes. Eisenkot's prioritiesNadav Eyal, one of Israel's most prominent journalists, who has followed Eisenkot's political career, says the loss of his son fills the candidate "with a sense of purpose and mission." According to Eyal, this mission is not limited to his party, Yashar, winning enough seats in the Knesset to form an alternative coalition to Netanyahu's. Like Netanyahu, Eisenkot is convinced that any future plan for Gaza must exclude Hamas and promises to finish off the organization within 18 months. "It is very important to understand that his son was killed by Hamas, in a war that Hamas started," Eyal told the BBC. The retired general also does not express support for a two-state solution (the recognition of a Palestinian state alongside an Israeli one). At the end of August, he said that anyone who still believed in that possibility was a "dreamer," according to Israeli media. However, he says he intends to "redefine" Israel's relations with the Palestinian Authority."The Palestinian Authority must be allowed to govern the 2.8 million Palestinians [in the occupied West Bank]. I don't want to govern them," he said in an October interview with The Times of Israel. Image source, Anadolu via Getty ImagesCaption, Eisenkot has pledged to curb the violence of Jewish settlers against Palestinians in the West Bank. While Eisenkot supports the expansion of the main settlement blocs, he is against the controversial plans to increase the presence of Jewish settlers in some areas of the West Bank, more specifically the plan to promote the expansion of a settlement in an area known as E1, east of Jerusalem. More recently he promised to "expel the Jewish terrorists from Judea and Samaria" (the name Israel uses to refer to the occupied West Bank), comments that seem driven by international rejection of the settlements. Investigating NetanyahuOne of his campaign promises is to launch an investigation into the October 7 attacks to examine possible failures of the Israeli government. The country's main media outlets have published allegations that Netanyahu was warned of a possible attack from Gaza by the authorities of the United Arab Emirates and Egypt. The prime minister denies the allegations, has sued the Israeli newspaper that made the initial report, and refused to be investigated by a judiciary he believes is predisposed against him. Image source, ReutersCaption, Eisenkot is one of many Israeli politicians pushing for a public investigation into the October 7, 2023 attacks. Eisenkot also commits to launching an emergency program to address the problem of highly qualified Israelis leaving the country and to stimulate the arrival of new immigrants. He also wants to end the military service exemption rules for ultra-Orthodox Jewish communities and Israeli Arabs, a very sensitive issue in the country. Previous attempts to expand military service, including one by Netanyahu's government, sparked protests from ultra-Orthodox communities. Humble origins and military careerImage source, ReutersCaption, Polls suggest a very close race between Gadi Eisenkot and Benjamin Netanyahu, although neither is expected to win an absolute majority. Born in Tiberias and raised in Eilat, two cities far from Israel's main centers of political power (Jerusalem and Tel Aviv), Eisenkot is the son of modest Moroccan immigrants who settled in Israel in the 1950s. Eisenkot belongs to the Mizrahi Jewish community. Although other Mizrahim tried before him, none managed to become prime minister. The New Yorker editor David Remnick, who spent time with Eisenkot during the campaign, says the candidate can challenge Netanyahu's image as a defender of marginalized groups in Israeli society such as the Mizrahim. A descendant of Eastern European Jews, Netanyahu grew up in an affluent neighborhood of Jerusalem, which contrasts with Eisenkot's modest origins. Image source, ReutersCaption, Eisenkot supported the invasion of Gaza after the October 7 attacks and opposes the creation of a Palestinian state. Eisenkot joined the army at 18 and spent 40 years in it, rising to the post of chief of staff, which he held from 2015 to 2019. In the 2000s he commanded Israeli forces in the West Bank during the Second Intifada, a Palestinian uprising that lasted four years in which nearly 1,000 Israelis and more than 3,000 Palestinians died. As a soldier, Eisenkot was associated with the "Dahiya Doctrine," which advocates the overwhelming use of military force against civilian infrastructure in areas from which Israel believes it is being attacked. And, despite all his criticism of Netanyahu, he never spoke out against the Israeli military response to the October 7 attacks."We are forced to defend ourselves. We must honestly examine where all this began," Eisenkot told The Times of Israel. Journalist and broadcaster Mehdi Hasan wrote in the British newspaper The Guardian that although "Eisenkot is not Netanyahu," he would allow "the same policies of expansion and destruction in both the West Bank and Gaza." Anshel Pfeffer, The Economist magazine's correspondent in Israel and author of a biography of Netanyahu, says Eisenkot "is not a pacifist.""But he also has the image of a serious man," Pfeffer told the BBC. Pfeffer notes that Eisenkot's emergence as Netanyahu's direct rival was somewhat unexpected."Until six months ago, the most likely rival was [former prime minister] Naftali Bennett. But Eisenkot seems to have connected with the electorate at the right moment."Eisenkot is often described as the opposite of Netanyahu: a man who does not do well under the spotlight and who is not a great political orator. Journalist Nadav Eyal believes he doesn't even like being a politician. The negotiation gameImage source, ReutersCaption, Netanyahu has managed to form a government after six of the ten elections he has contested. Although the polls favor him, Eisenkot's party is not expected to win the absolute majority of 61 deputies needed to form a government and, as often happens in Israel, he would have to seek a coalition. Netanyahu is a master at that: he has contested ten national elections as leader of Likud and on six occasions managed to form a coalition government. Netanyahu's campaign points out that Eisenkot would need the support of Arab-led parties to form a government. Arab parties are popular among the more than two million Arab citizens and residents in Israel (about 20% of the country's population), and polls show that the four main Arab parties could win between 12 and 15 seats."Do you want a Jewish state or do you want a Palestinian state?" Netanyahu asked Eisenkot in a campaign video. Eisenkot publicly rules out the presence of Arab parties in his government, but does not close the door to an anti-Netanyahu alliance in the Knesset."Netanyahu has stayed in power thanks to his ability to persuade his supporters that voting for him is a matter of life or death," Tel Aviv-based political analyst Dahlia Scheindlin tells the BBC. But this time he is facing a military man and that could change things, since, as Scheindlin points out, Israelis have great confidence in the army. This article was originally written in English and we used an artificial intelligence tool to translate it. A BBC journalist reviewed the text before publication. More information on how we use AI. Download the new BBC World Service app. Choose BBC News Mundo and receive news alerts, documentaries and analysis, all in one place. Important: the new app is not available in the UK or the United States. You can also follow us on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, X and on our WhatsApp channel. And don't forget to subscribe here to our newsletter to receive a special selection of our best content every Friday.