A Pardon Too Late

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has “shot himself in the head—not the foot—” by seeking a presidential pardon in the corruption cases against him. He now risks becoming the first Israeli premier to openly and shamelessly request clemency for crimes he publicly denies. The move has already provoked a fierce backlash: mass demonstrations have erupted outside the President’s residence, with protesters demanding that the appeal be rejected, making the prospect of a pardon increasingly remote.

And even if, hypothetically, a pardon were granted, it would end his political career in disgrace. Under Israeli law, a pardon requires a formal admission of guilt—a condition Netanyahu has spent years fighting. In seeking clemency, he has trapped himself: caught between admitting guilt to save himself from prison or rejecting a pardon and facing trial—a textbook case of being caught between a rock and a hard place. Even members of his own camp have turned on him: former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, now the frontrunner to replace him, bluntly declared he would support a pardon only if Netanyahu leaves politics forever.

Netanyahu’s bid for a pardon caps years of political decay. Long before the Gaza war, he was fighting for his political survival. His efforts to push legislation weakening the independence of Israel’s Supreme Court were widely interpreted as an attempt to evade the corruption charges hanging over him. The backlash was unprecedented: hundreds of thousands of Israelis took to the streets week after week, accusing him of dismantling democracy to save himself. His approval ratings plunged. His coalition wobbled. His future looked bleak.

Then came the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023—brutal, devastating, and indefensible. But it also offered Netanyahu something he desperately needed: a national crisis through which he could suspend scrutiny, sideline the courts, and unify his fractured coalition.

Instead of opting for a calibrated military response or diplomatic channels, Netanyahu launched a campaign of destruction unprecedented in the modern Middle East. Entire neighbourhoods were flattened. Hospitals and shelters were bombed. Food, water, and medicine were blocked. Gaza — once a densely packed coastal strip — was turned into what UN officials called an “uninhabitable wasteland.”

The civilian toll soared to more than 60,000 dead, overwhelmingly women and children. The war spiralled far beyond military necessity, fueling accusations from global human-rights groups and even Israeli security officials that Netanyahu had weaponised mass violence to prolong his time in office.

If the war were truly about national security, Netanyahu would have embraced ceasefire deals — many of which included the release of Israeli hostages. Instead, he repeatedly sabotaged truce negotiations, prolonging both the war and the suffering. Every day Gaza burned was another day his own legal reckoning was delayed.

But the strategy ultimately backfired.

Netanyahu’s pardon plea triggered immediate outrage. Thousands began gathering outside President Isaac Herzog’s house, holding signs reading:

“No Pardon for War Criminals”

“Justice, Not Immunity”

“You Destroyed Gaza — You Will Not Escape Trial”

A father who lost two sons in the October 7 attack but opposes Netanyahu’s Gaza war summed up the nation’s fury:

“He used our pain to bomb a nation. Now he wants mercy? No. He cannot bury Gaza and walk away clean.”

These protests span the political spectrum—reservists, tech leaders, Likud defectors, hostage families, and Holocaust survivors. For many Israelis, the pardon request was the moment Netanyahu’s self-preservation became undeniably blatant.

Netanyahu’s allies have begun to desert him. Naftali Bennett’s conditional support — a pardon only if Netanyahu quits politics — amounts to a political execution disguised as generosity. Accepting such terms would confirm Netanyahu’s guilt and end his career on the most humiliating note imaginable.

Even Netanyahu’s own legal team is reportedly pessimistic about his chances. Presidential pardons are not tools for the innocent — they are instruments of mercy for those who concede wrongdoing. To accept one is to accept the stain of guilt.

Even if Netanyahu were pardoned for corruption, no piece of paper can absolve him of his role in Gaza’s devastation. International courts are investigating. Survivors are documenting evidence. Israeli officials themselves have accused him of prolonging the war for political survival.

Netanyahu once believed the destruction of Gaza would drown out his scandals. Instead, Gaza has become the defining indictment of his premiership.

Netanyahu’s bid for a pardon is not a path to survival—it is the final proof of guilt. It is political self-immolation. It confirms what many Israelis and much of the world have long suspected: that he would sacrifice anything—democracy, justice, even tens of thousands of civilian lives—to preserve his own power.

And no presidential signature will shield Netanyahu from the judgment of history — or from the moral consequences of the devastation he oversaw.

Views expressed are personal. The writer has worked in senior editorial positions for many renowned international publications