Roughly 24 hours before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu launched a blistering assault on Iran, Israel’s opposition was scheming to bring down his government.

Now, just days into the ongoing operation against Iran, the opposition has closed ranks behind the effort, suspending months of bitter criticism against Netanyahu and his handling of the war in Gaza.

It’s a sharp about-face for a constellation of parties that have criticized Netanyahu throughout the war for what they have charged is his politically motivated decision-making.

“It’s not the right moment to do politics,” opposition leader and former Prime Minister Yair Lapid told The Associated Press on Monday in his first international media interview since the start of the operation against Iran.

The latest conflict began when Israel launched an assault on Iran’s top military leaders, uranium enrichment sites and nuclear scientists that it said was necessary to prevent its longtime adversary from getting any closer to building an atomic weapon — which Israel says would pose an existential threat. Iran maintains that its nuclear program is peaceful.

Lapid spoke just days after he called from the dais of the Israeli parliament for an election to oust Netanyahu.

“Yes, this government needs to be toppled, but not in the midst of an existential fight,” Lapid said.

And that fight has become personal. His son’s home was damaged in an Iranian strike, although no one was there at the time except for house pets.

“We didn’t rally behind the government,” Lapid said from his party office in Tel Aviv. “We rallied behind the necessity to operate on the moment that was inevitable.”

Lapid, a former television anchorman and one-time boxer, entered politics in 2013. He became caretaker prime minister briefly in 2022, as part of a deal with another party. He didn’t succeed in forming a coalition in an election held shortly after, which returned Netanyahu to power.

Lapid said that the politics were irrelevant now, because striking Iran was “the right thing to do.”

“Binyamin Netanyahu is a bitter political rival,” said Lapid. “I think he’s the wrong person to lead the country. But on that, he was right.”

(AP & YWN Israel Desk—Jerusalem)