In December of 2018, the Knesset voted to dissolve itself, triggering early elections. Since then, the Jewish state had two inconclusive elections, both resulting in do-overs, and a third that yielded a unity government, which lasted for all of seven months. The fourth election, held on Tuesday, has proved similarly indecisive, and the possibility of another unstable and short-lived governing coalition, or even a fifth election, looms large. David Horovitz takes stock of the situation:

The pro-Netanyahu camp has 52 of the 120 Knesset seats. The anti-Netanyahu camp has 57. Naftali Bennett’s [right-wing] Yamina, possibly inclined toward Netanyahu, has seven. And the great election confounder, the conservative Islamic Ra’am party—which not one of the three ostensibly ultra-accurate TV exit polls predicted would make it into the Knesset—has four.

Dismally, Israel has been hamstrung by political crisis since way back in December 2018. . . . But its politics have not been paralyzed. These latest inconclusive elections saw Gideon Sa’ar break away from Likud, and Bennett directly challenge Netanyahu—rivals from his own side of the spectrum who rendered Tuesday’s vote the closest yet to a pure referendum on the prime minister, with forces left, right, and center all vying to oust him.

He’s not finished yet, but neither was he victorious, despite the vaccination success, which enabled the electorate to cram the supermarkets, beaches, and restaurants on election day.

Four inconclusive votes in less than two years, with no state budget and a crippled parliament, would indicate that [Israel’s] electoral system is dysfunctional. For now, at least, the pillars of our democracy are holding firm.

With the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program damaged, and its regional influence diminished, the U.S. must now prevent it from recovering, and, if possible, weaken it further. Benjamin Baird argues that it can do both through economic means—if Congress does its part:

Legislation that codifies President Donald Trump’s “maximum pressure” policies into law, places sanctions on Iran’s energy sales, and designates the regime’s proxy armies as foreign terrorist organizations will go a long way toward containing Iran’s regime and encouraging its downfall. . . . Congress has already introduced much of the legislation needed to bring the ayatollah to his knees, and committee chairmen need only hold markup hearings to advance these bills and send them to the House and Senate floors.

They should start with the HR 2614—the Maximum Support Act. What the Iranian people truly need to overcome the regime is protection from the state security apparatus.

Next, Congress must get to work dismantling Iran’s proxy army in Iraq. By sanctioning and designating a list of 29 Iran-backed Iraqi militias through the Florida representative Greg Steube’s Iranian Terror Prevention Act, the U.S. can shut down . . . groups like the Badr Organization and Kataib Hizballah, which are part of the Iranian-sponsored armed groups responsible for killing hundreds of American service members.

Those same militias are almost certainly responsible for a series of drone attacks on oilfields in Iraq over the past few days