His appointment as new Prime Minister Yair Lapid yesterday (Thursday) also caused a stir in the world media, which covered his inauguration. A number of international media outlets welcomed the incoming prime minister, referring mainly to his past as a TV presenter.
“The former TV presenter who became Israel’s new prime minister,” read the BBC, in a profile they prepared about Lapid. “In the 10 years since he became a TV presenter and politician, Lapid has dreamed of becoming the prime minister of Israel. Now the center man will try to prove that he deserves the most senior position in the long run.”
An article by Yoland Kennel in the veteran British news agency reads: “The amateur boxer is expected to absorb attacks from Benjamin Netanyahu, whom he managed to remove from the Prime Minister’s Office in 2021 following the unexpected alliance between 8 ideologically diverse parties.” In a comprehensive review of Lapid’s past, the documentation was mentioned in which he said that he “does not understand anything in the economy,” which Netanyahu often uses to attack him.
The New York Times, on the other hand, referred to the fact that Lapid is the caretaker Prime Minister and will not have the authority to make far-reaching policy changes. The American newspaper added: “The 58-year-old Lapid supports the concept of a Palestinian state, but has agreed to stop efforts to persuade right-wingers like Bennett to join the coalition.” Lapid was defined in the article: “a center man and a broadcaster who became a legislator.”
In the magazine Atlantic, we updated an article about Lapid from six months ago following the latest developments. In the latest version, it was published by the American writer Yair Rosenberg that “for years, Lapid was not considered by many in the world media. I have interviewed him many times in recent years and watched him read for a vision of a different Israeli future.”
In the same article published under the headline “Why do you not know Israel’s new prime minister?”, Rosenberg wrote: “Most of the media did not consider him from the beginning. Taste of the month “for Israeli voters of the Third Way parties. In 2013, the New Yorker published a 9,000-word article on the future of Israeli politics and did not even talk to Lapid. They shouted fists, and refused to take him seriously as a thinker or politician. “
“The conqueror of hearts who came to the hot seat,” Lapid was called by the Reuters news agency. “As a TV star and columnist for a newspaper, Lapid called his weekly column ‘To be Israeli.’ “After being appointed prime minister. Lapid, still styled but with graying hair, will have to reach a wider audience to preserve his government and win the November 1 election.”