By Fareed Zakaria, CNN

While incumbent politicians around the world are struggling to hold on, one is thriving so much so that he's been called a king.

I'm talking about Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who last week struck a deal to bring one of his main rivals, the Kadima party, into his government. Netanyahu's coalition now commands more than three-quarters of the Knesset — the largest parliamentary majority in Israeli history.

Netanyahu faces no plausible rival as prime minister. So he has an unusual, and perhaps unique, opportunity to use his new power to secure Israel's future.

When pushed on the Palestinian issue, Netanyahu has often cited the constraints of his coalition to explain why he had not taken bolder steps toward resolution. In the past, he seemed to like being restrained: He refused to form a national unity government in 1996 with Shimon Peres, and he refused again in 2009 with Tzipi Livni.

But now he has enough broad support — a big enough base with many moderates — that he could move toward a peace settlement without endangering his hold on power.

What should Netanyahu do next? Read Fareed’s Washington Post column to see what he thinks.

By Fareed Zakaria

While incumbents around the world are struggling to hold on, one is thriving. By bringing the rival Kadima party into his ruling coalition, Benjamin Netanyahu has become “king of Israel,” in Aaron David Miller’s phrase. He has an unusual, perhaps unique, opportunity to use his new power to secure Israel’s future.

Netanyahu’s coalition now commands the largest parliamentary majority in Israeli history. He faces no plausible rival as prime minister. When pushed on the Palestinian issue, Netanyahu has often cited the constraints of his coalition to explain why he had not taken bolder steps toward resolution. Perhaps he liked being constrained: He refused to form a national unity government in 1996 (with Shimon Peres) and refused again in 2009 (with Tzipi Livni). But now he has a broad enough base of support - with many moderates - and could move toward a peace settlement without endangering his hold on power.

Look beneath the recent war fears, and Israel is in a stronger position than ever.

Read more of my Washington Post column on why Israel is stronger than ever - and what Netanyahu should do with its strength.

Editor's note: Aaron David Miller is a public policy scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and served as a Middle East negotiator in Democratic and Republican administrations. He is the author of the forthcoming book "Can America Have Another Great President?" The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Aaron David Miller.

With 30-plus governments since independence (average length less than two years), Israeli politics rarely surprises. But Monday's agreement between Benjamin Netanyahu and Kadima leader Shaul Mofaz did precisely that.

In a pre-emptive strike - against his critics, a cynical Israeli press, and, last but not least, an American administration that keeps hoping he's a short-timer - Netanyahu bought himself another 16 months of challenge-free politics, co-opted his main opponent for the price of a deputy premiership, and broadened and legitimized his government for the turbulent period ahead.

While Mofaz looks unprincipled (two weeks ago he said he'd never join a Netanyahu-led coalition), Bibi Netanyahu looks like a veritable statesman and political genius who, for the sake of the country's unity and stability, did the right thing. With U.S. President Barack Obama facing an uncertain political future, Netanyahu has secured his - at least over the short term.

What difference will the new coalition of 94 Knesset members - a virtually unassailable majority - have on the core issues facing Israel?

Read more

Editor’s Note: This is an edited version of an article from the ‘Oxford Analytica Daily Brief’. Oxford Analytica is a global analysis and advisory firm that draws on a worldwide network of experts to advise its clients on their strategy and performance.

Israeli Chief of Staff Benny Gantz reportedly said yesterday that he did not believe Iran would decide to build an atomic bomb. Officials in Tehran argue that Israel will not launch a military strike against Iranian nuclear facilities due to its fear of retaliation. While the Iranian regime tends to exaggerate its military capabilities, it has a number of options that, in a worst-case scenario, would broaden an Iranian-Israeli conflict into a global campaign against Israel, the United States and their allies.

Iran's response to any Israeli attack will depend heavily on whether Israel limits its strikes to a handful of nuclear sites or targets the Islamic Republic's centers of power. FULL POST

On Sunday, I interviewed the former Prime Minister and current Defense Minister of Israel, Ehud Barak. We spoke about Israel's settlement activities in the West Bank and the degree to which they may jeopardize future discussions with the Palestinians about the creation of  a Palestinian state.

Here's a transcript of our discussion:

Fareed Zakaria: You ordered, this week, the removal of a settler family from Hebron over the prime minister's objections because you believed you had to uphold the law.

But yet, there is a similar situation going on with settlers in the Beit El community, where a court has ordered that the settlements be evacuated and yet the government, the prime minister has told the attorney general to find some other solution. Why would you not uphold the law and a court order in that case, as well? FULL POST

On Sunday, I interviewed the former Prime Minister and current Defense Minister of Israel, Ehud Barak. We spoke about Israel's "window of opportunity" to strike Iran and the future of the Palestinian Authority.

Here's a transcript of our discussion:

Fareed Zakaria: You have long argued that we need more pressure on Iran. President Obama announced recently that he believes that the supplies of oil in the world are sufficient to pursue an even more stringent set of sanctions against Iran.  These will be the tightest, harshest sanctions that have ever been put in place, I think, against any country.

Do you think that this will be enough to put the kind of pressure on Iran that you have wanted?  FULL POST

Sunday at 10am and 1pm EST on CNN's GPS, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak discusses a range of issues including the possibility of an Israeli strike on Iran.

In the excerpt below, Barak addresses the issue of Israel's settlement building.

Fareed Zakaria: The Palestinians are sending you a letter, though, arguing that if negotiations between the Palestinians and the Israelis must resume, Israel must stop building settlements - creating facts on the ground that will make it more and more difficult to create a two-state solution. Is there any prospect of that happening?

Ehud Barak: Fareed, I hope that it will happen. I think that most of the burden for the inability to move in the last three years happens to be on the Palestinians' shoulders, not on ours. FULL POST

Hundreds of you have submitted very thoughtful questions for me through Facebook, Twitter and my blog. Here is my response to the question: When countries acquire nuclear weapons, don't they become more emboldened on the world stage?

Nuclear weapons don’t create some kind of magical change of geopolitical position. Do they provide you with some additional sense of immunity and power? Probably they do because it becomes unlikely that the United States is going to invade. But in the case of Pakistan, there was no such guarantee with regards to what India’s actions were going to be.

Does anyone really thing that North Korea or Pakistan are regarded as fearsome adversaries, countries to emulate, countries with great influence in the councils of the world? No. They are regarded as basket cases - failed states that are dangerous largely because they are unstable and are run by irresponsible governments that are willing to do destabilizing things in their region. The result is they are more watched, cordoned off and contained then ever before. FULL POST

Editor's Note: The following is an excerpt from an op-ed in The Washington Post.

By Fareed Zakaria

In 1989, Margaret Thatcher said in a toast to Mikhail Gorbachev, “Both our countries know from bitter experience that conventional weapons do not deter war in Europe, whereas nuclear weapons have done so for over 40 years. As a deterrent there is no substitute for them.”

If deterrence doesn’t work, then why are we not preparing preventive war against Russia, which still has a fearsome arsenal of intercontinental ballistic missiles? Or against Pakistan, home to a military-intelligence regime that has been implicated in more major acts of terrorism in the past 10 years than Iran has in the past hundred? The argument that Iran would be deterred does not rest on its reasonableness but on the regime’s desire to survive. “Rulers want to have a country that they can continue to rule,” says Kenneth Waltz, one of the most distinguished theorists of international relations. FULL POST

Editor's note: Mohammed Ayoob is University Distinguished Professor of International Relations at Michigan State University and adjunct scholar at the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding. The views expressed in this article are his own.

By Mohammed Ayoob – Special to CNN

During the past few weeks the drums of war have been beating loud and clear. Prime Minister Netanyahu, during his meeting with President Obama and his speech to AIPAC, made it very clear that Israel reserves the right to attack Iran if it comes to it - even against the wishes of the United States. Ostensibly the difference between Washington and Tel Aviv seems to be on the issue of timing. This, in turn, is based on divergent interpretations of where the red line should be drawn in terms of Iran’s presumed nuclear capacity. While a highly subjective definition of “nuclear capability” appears to be the red line for Israel, “weaponization” or at least clear evidence of it is Washington’s preferred red line.

This semantic difference hides a fundamental disjuncture between American and Israeli approaches to the subject. Israel defines the red line in terms of its narrow strategic and political interests in the Middle East.  Israel believes it is threatened by the perception, leave alone the reality, of an Iranian nuclear weapons capability. America, as a world power, has larger interests at stake both in the region and in terms of its image and credibility globally.

FULL POST