Mr. Ben-Gvir had already proved to be an unreliable and troublesome coalition partner. Demanding wage hikes for the police, he refused to support the government in passing a crucial piece of legislation last month, forcing Mr. Netanyahu to leave his hospital bed as he was recovering from prostate surgery and vote in the assembly to make sure the law passed.
Mr. Netanyahu has held frequent and lengthy meetings with Mr. Smotrich in recent days to persuade him to remain in the coalition. After three hours of talks between Mr. Smotrich and his party’s lawmakers on Thursday, the party issued an ultimatum demanding a promise from Mr. Netanyahu that he would resume the war against Hamas immediately after the first six-week cease-fire as a condition for Mr. Smotrich’s staying in government.
Mr. Netanyahu, meanwhile, held off convening the cabinet for a vote to ratify the deal, citing last-minute disputes with Hamas over the details.
Mr. Netanyahu is battling corruption charges in a lengthy trial and risks facing a public reckoning once the war ends for the military and policy failures in the run-up to Hamas’s 2023 attack. Given the circumstances, some analysts believe that he will opt to scupper the second phase of the deal, if Hamas doesn’t do so first, to keep his coalition intact.
“Netanyahu wants to stay in power,” said Gayil Talshir, a political scientist at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. “It doesn’t make any sense for him to go to elections that he might not win. He wants another two years leading the government.”
Mr. Netanyahu could yet reach understandings with Mr. Smotrich. Even if the finance minister joins Mr. Ben-Gvir in leaving the coalition, Mr. Netanyahu could, at least for a while, hang on as head a minority government. Opposition party leaders say they will provide Mr. Netanyahu with a political safety net for the sake of peace.
In any event, the government is likely to survive until the end of the first phase of the deal, said Yohanan Plesner, president of the Israel Democracy Institute, a nonpartisan research group in Jerusalem.
But Mr. Netanyahu may have to decide between his parliamentary majority and his relationship with the incoming administration in Washington, with Mr. Trump and Saudi Arabia perhaps offering him the opportunity to burnish his legacy.
“I think his mind is already in the next big move,” Mr. Plesner said of Mr. Netanyahu, adding, “If he has to choose between an intimate relationship with the Trump administration and Smotrich and Ben-Gvir, he’ll opt for Trump.”
American and Israeli officials have said that the deal reached this week is very similar to the proposal that President Biden outlined last May.
