ABSTRACT
The Netanyahu Era: From Crisis to Crisis, 1996-99
Neill Lochery
During the Netanyahu era the Israeli political system was in a period of transition, caused to a large extent by the adoption of a new electoral system in 1996 which was designed to reduce the level of political horsetrading that had characterized Israeli politics during the 1980s. In reality, as Netanyahu was to find to his cost, the new system severely constrained the Prime Minister's room for manoeuvre, making him ever more vulnerable to his own party, the cabinet and the government coalition. This, in turn, had an adverse impact on the Arab-Israeli peace process, as Netanyahu vainly sought to navigate between Likud's ideological precepts and his own pragmatic disposition.
