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aj-the-cat · 3 years ago

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Turned

Masterlist

The Undertaker (Ministry) and F!Reader

Tags: If you'd like to be on my tag list, please let me know!

Warnings: Blood drinking, human agony

Based on my personal headcannon that Ministry Taker was basically a vampire. Enjoy!

Also, heres a key for anyone who doesn't know them:

(E/C) - Eye color

(H/C) - Hair color

(Y/N) - Your name

Hurried footsteps sounded on the cobble floor. Dressed in all black, loose clothing, the man was rushing to deliver a message. Out of breath, he finally reached his destination: a room designated to two men. He knocked on the large wooden door, and a broad man answered, a cigar hanging out of his mouth.

"What's your business, Mideon?" The man asked. The footman, Mideon, wheezed out his reply. "The Dark Lord calls for you and Farooq." The man seemed to think for a second, then lowered his head back down to Mideon. "Alright. We shall be down. Now go." Mideon scurried away as the door closed.

Inside the room, the man went back to the table in the middle where his friend sat, pondering over some playing cards. "Deadman calls." The man said. His friend looked up. "What for?" He questioned. The man shrugged. "Who knows with him. Now let's get going, we don't want to anger him by being late." His friend stood up and both of them walked out the door and to their master's throne room.

~* *~

The castle, known as the Calaway Castle, or the Dark Castle to the city down the mountain, was ruled by one man: The Undertaker. Nobody knows his real name, not even his dark court.

The victorian-esque castle was made of dark brick, with monster-like designs all over. The gates guards were literal gargoyles. No sunlight got through the cursed sky over it.

Inside, The Undertaker sat on his throne. A large symbol was hung over it, it looked like a T with an x on the bottom. The throne was black, with purple trim and a large back. He was dressed in a flowing black robe, the hood covering his eyes.

Beside him, was a littler version of his throne, but in it sat a woman. She was dressed in a simple dress, all black, it hugged her upper body and flowed out a little at her waist. No skin was shown, her neck, arms, and legs were all covered by the dress. She wore a head necklace with the same symbol above the man beside her.

The woman was strikingly beautiful, her (E/C) eyes were soft, full of love and life. Her (H/C) was french braided and flowed down her shoulder, just stopping at the middle of her chest. She stood out, she looked like she didn't belong in this dark castle.

The doors to the throne room opened, catching the dark pair's attention. The men Mideon called for walked through, chests tattooed with three strange symbols each. They walked up to The Undertaker's throne and kneeled. "You called us, Master. What is your desire?" They asked unison.

Undertaker took off his hood, looking down at his muscle men with striking green eyes. "Ah, Bradshaw, Farooq. Take my fiancé to her chambers. The day of the ceremony has come upon us." He gestured to the woman beside him, who smiled sweetly. "Yes, Master." The pair replied.

The woman got up off her throne, kissed Undertaker on the cheek, and went down to meet the men. They continued to kneel. "Get up, please." She asked. Both men stood up. "Follow me." She walked out of the throne room, Farooq and Bradshaw on either side of her. Undertaker sighed and looked to his left, where a squat, round man stood, reading through a book. "Paul, the time is now. Prepare for the ceremony." The squat man, Paul, looked up from his book. "As you wish, my lord." He replied and scurried off through the throne room doors, leaving Undertaker alone to think about tonight.

~* *~

The three walked down the castle corridors, bootsteps sounding on the floor. The woman was barefoot, the cool stone tickled her feet as she walked.

Farooq and Bradshaw stopped at an elegent looking door, with the same strange symbol burned into the door. They positioned themselves on either side of the door, then opened it for the woman. She smiled sweetly and padded inside.

Inside, three identical figures stood, robes and masks covering identifying features of them. "Welcome, Lady (Y/N)." They bowed simultaneously. Their voices were the same, very robotic and neutral.

The three straightened and stared straight ahead at nothing. "The Master has instructed us to prepare you for your ceremony tonight." Setting the creepiness aside, Lady (Y/N) smiled at them and bowed a little. "Thank you. You may start whatever you have to do." She straightened her head and the left-most one approached her.

The two figures stood as the first one stripped Lady (Y/N) of her dress and undergarments. A blush found its way to her cheeks as she stood naked, awaiting the next instruction of the figures. "There is no reason to be embarrassed, Lady (Y/N). Now, follow us to the bathroom." The figures walked to the door leading to the connected bathroom and walked inside, Lady (Y/N) following in tow.

The bathroom was exquisite, marble tile on the walls and floors. A huge bathtub sat in the middle, with a sink and shower on either side of it. One of the figures had started the water, and another was laying out materials on the little table beside the tub.

The figure that had taken Lady (Y/N)'s clothes stood beside her and gently guided her to the side of tub. A bath bomb had already been placed in the tub, turning the water a baby pink. The sweet smell of strawberries wafted from the water.

Lady (Y/N) stepped in the water and sunk down in the warm liquid. The figures gathered soap and one of them started gently pouring water on her head, wetting her hair. They poured a generous amount of shampoo on her head and massaged it in. Lady (Y/N) closed her eyes and enjoyed the experience.

The shampoo was washed out of her hair, and the figure repeated the process with conditioner and a leave-in hair mask. Another had begin washing her body, taking a soaped up loofah and rubbing it all over her body. The last one picked up some shaving cream and a razor and waited for the other figures to finish what they were doing.

The two figures stopped, and the one at her head wrapped her hair in a towel, while the other guided her out of the bath and on the side of the tub. They towel dried her body and the last one began their work.

They placed shaving cream up her legs, on her pelvis and underarms. Then they got to work, placing the razor on the bottom of her legs and working up. The others prepared the vanity with other tools for pampering. Lady (Y/N) looked away from the figure shaving her and fixated her attention to the ones preparing the vanity.

The one shaving was gentle, using long and careful strokes upward, careful not to knick her. After all, she had to be perfect for their Master.

Eventually, they had finished up and rinsed off Lady (Y/N)'s body. They wrapped her in a fluffy towel and led her to the vanity, where the other two were waiting. She sat down and they got to work.

One placed wax strips along her eyebrows and upper lip. It was painful taking them off, but they soothed the areas with cooling aloe gel. The other took her hair out of the towel and picked up a blow dryer and dried her hair.

After that, her hair was lightly curled, and part of it was pulled back and braided. The other began putting on very light makeup. Sheer foundation, little concealer, and a smokey eye look to make it pop. A light blush and highlighter was applied, and to top it off, a nude lipstick.

One of them had placed your head necklace with the symbol on the end back on her head, and her time at the vanity was complete.

The three had led her back to her room, and on the large bed sat a beautiful black victorian dress, with purple accents and a veil to boot. A gasp escaped Lady (Y/N)'s mouth as she laid her eyes on the dress. It had long sleeves that came off the chest piece, and it was designed to reveal her shoulders and neck.

She didn't notice one of the figures had disappeared, but they came back holding a neat pile of clothes. "The Master asks that you wear this under your dress." They held out the pile and she got a good look at it. It was a deep red corset lingerie set. Lady (Y/N)'s face grew pink and she began to stammer a bit.

"Please, do not be ebarrassed. It is for the consumation of your marriage tonight." The one holding the set said. Lady (Y/N) took a deep breath and composed herself. "Ok, please continue." She replied. They figures got to work dressing her.

The corset set was put on first, with thigh high sheer stockings, garter bands to hold them up, panties and lastly the corset itself. The figure tied it to make it easy to untie. The others had gathered the dress and accessories and patiently waited for the lingerie to go on.

After they had finished with the corset, the other two swooped in and dressed her. The dress perfectly fit Lady (Y/N). Black flats were put on her feet, the veil on her head, and she was handed a black and red bouquet of roses.

The figures stepped back and looked at their work. Lady (Y/N) was very beautiful, and now ready for the ceremony tonight. The figures lined back up to their original place when she first entered the room and bowed. "Our work is now complete. You may leave."

Lady (Y/N) stood frozen for a second, taking this moment in. She was getting married and turned tonight. She had never dreamed of this happening in her life, but here she is, standing in her wedding dress about to get married. Tears wanted to reach her eyes, but she regained her calm composure and walked to the door that leads to the hall. She knocked lightly and Bradshaw opened it.

She stepped out, and the the two men stepped on either side of her again, although this time black bowties were around their broad necks. They looked silly, and she giggled a bit before the two men lead her down the hall.

They walked for while, and thoughts swarmed Lady (Y/N)'s head. Positive and negative clashed, but soon those thoughts washed away as she realized Farooq and Bradshaw were opening the door to the ceremony hall. Creatures of the night sat in the darkness, the only thing seen were the red dots of eyes.

A path was illuminated that led to a platform, and standing on that platform was her fiancé, dressed in a more elegant robe than before. On a higher platform stood Paul Bearer, holding a decorated book with a language on the front she couldn't read.

Eerie music started up, and Bradshaw nudged the small of her back as a signal to start walking.

Lady (Y/N) walked up the path, the lights disappearing behind her as she walked forward. When she reached the platform where the Lord of Darkness stood, the music stopped and the only lights that were left were the ones illuminating the couple and Paul.

Paul cleared his throat and spoke up. "Before we start this ceremony today, the Lord of Darkness wants to clear up some overdue business." He gestured to Undertaker.

The man in question held up his head and looked down upon Lady (Y/N), and with one gentle hand he caressed his soon-to-be wife's cheek. "I understand you wish to become a vampire like me, correct?" He asked. Lady (Y/N) nodded. "Yes, my Lord. I want to live forever with my love by my side." Undertaker smirked, showing a bit of fang.

"Very well, my love." He replied. He took his hand off her cheek and lifted up the arm of his robe, exposing his wrist.

"This will be painful for you. Are you sure you want to continue?" He asked. Lady (Y/N) had a determined look in her eye. "I do." She replied. Undertaker closed his eyes. He said nothing, and his green eyes opened again.

Undertaker opened his mouth, revealing long and sharp fangs, and bringing his wrist up to his mouth, he knicked a wound open. "Drink, my love. Let the blood of a vampire king flow through you!" He brought his wrist up to Lady (Y/N)'s mouth and she hesitantly started to drink.

After a while os silenced drinking, Lady (Y/N)'s knees buckled under her and she dropped to the floor, shivering in pain. Undertaker dropped down next to her and held her as her body changed. "Begin the ceremony, Paul!" He shouted. Paul snapped out of his personal tranced and held the book up to his face.

"Dearly unbeloved, we gather here this evening to join Lady (Y/N) and the unholy wedlock with the Lord of Darkness. Tonight, Lady (Y/N) will step from the light from this evil, cesspool, mortal world, into the sanctuary of eternal darkness. Keeping this in mind, will you, Lady (Y/N), accept the purity of evil, and take the Lord of Darkness as your Master and your spouse?"

Lady (Y/N) still shook in immense pain, and muffling a scream, she weakly let out an "I do". Undertaker rubbed her back gently, and Paul continued.

"Lord of Darkness, with it as your intent, do you accept Lady (Y/N), her body, her mind, her soul, and even her breath unto yourself, and allow her to bear your offspring?"

Undertaker's ears pricked at the 'bear your offspring' part, but her gripped his soon-to-be wife closer and answered. "I do." Paul continued again.

"Through the power vested in me by the Lord of Darkness, I now pronounce you as the unholy union of Darkness. You may now bite your bride!"

Lady (Y/N)'s eyes snapped open, revealing deep red irises and a cat eye pupil. The pair stood up, and moving Lady (Y/N)'s hair out of the way, he bit her neck, but didnt drink. He withdrew, and moved his hair out of the way for his new wife to bite.

She saw his skin and bit, but the urges inside her told her not to drink, and she withdrew just like her new husband had done. Mate bites. They were now bound together by marriage and by the bond of mates.

The pair looked each other in the eyes, the feeling of love strong in the room. Undertaker lifted his hand and cupped his now wife's cheek, and leaned in. Lady (Y/N) followed his actions and leaned in too, and they kissed passionately, so full of love, and now stronger with the bond.

#undertaker #ministry of darkness #x reader #one shot #wwf #wwe

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sky-kiss · 5 years ago

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Ghouldyn AU

A/N: Look. Just. Stick with me, okay? Or don’t. It doesn’t make a lot of sense. @morelemons and I were like. Hashing out the broad strokes of a Fallout 4 crossover AU. And like. Ghoul!Ardyn. And a whole story line. But then we needed setup to justify all that cuteness and Diamond City Adventure Boy!Noct and Vault Tech!Luna. So uh. This is that backstory. Just big old. Weird broad strokes. Of Ghoul!Ardyn’s life. I’m sorry.

_____

October 23, 2077

______

Centuries later, it will strike him as funny. Not in the traditional sense of the word. But a breed of humor purely unique to his life: macabre, grim. He’ll laugh as tears prick at his eyes.

The truth is Ardyn doesn’t remember the bombs dropping. He manages to miss the end of the world. He’s too piss drunk to make it home and too poor to call a taxi. It’s warm for October. Warm enough that he doesn’t think twice about slumping down in an alley. It was a nice neighborhood. He’d sleep off the whiskey and then stagger back to his apartment.

Yes, yes, dearies. The bombs fall and the radiation hits. Families are left clinging to one another, powerless as the fallout rolls towards them. And where is he? Alone. Slumped in a puddle of vomit, arm slung over his eyes. The curtain closes on a most ignominious scene.

When he finally awakens, the world is forever changed. Ash still drifts lazily on the breeze. The blue sky is gone, replaced with a perpetual orange. Some days the light with filter through at a strange angle and treat him to a flash of green.

There’s no bird song. No dogs barking. No ambient conversation to fill the emptiness. There’s only the silence and all the weight that comes with it. It’s the sound of death, he thinks. Death has come and stolen everything away.

Ardyn pulls his knees to his chest. His skin is badly burned; his body is bruised. The tears sting as they cut lazy rivulets through the dirt staining his cheeks. It’s deja vu. It’s Aera all over again, magnified to the nth power. Death sweeps into his life and steals everything away.

Only he is left behind.

____

The radiation does not kill him.

In some ways it is a far less mercyful fate. He manages to pick his way through the wreckage and find his back to what remains of the apartment complex. The silver lining of the whole situation is that he’s barely aware of his hangover. He’s too shell shocked to feel much of anything.

By some miracle, the building is still standing. Ardyn climbs those three familiar flights of stairs on instinct. He fishes inside his jacket for his keys. He locks the door behind him before stumbling over the liquor cabinet. The powers been out long enough for all the ice to have melted and so he takes four shots of whiskey neat. It helps take the edge off. Three more (simultaneously all that’s left in the bottle and the last bottle in the house) are just enough to chase him off to sleep. He never dreams when he drinks. For the first time in years, he dreads the silence.

____

His body begins to change. The radiation does not kill him, no. But it changes him.

His will not lie. He’s always taken a certain level of pride in his looks. People would stare as he passed. He was tall and strong and beautiful. And now, his skin seems to rot. His nose is gone. The bone structure remains the same but he is left an echo of his former self, monstrous.

It’s the hair he mourns the most. Strange and maroon and long enough to tickle at his shoulders. Aera had begged him never to cut it. Had delighted in running her fingers through the mass as they settled to sleep at night. The radiation takes that too. A pittance, in the grand scheme of things, but he mourns all the same.

____

Time passes.

His body continues to decay. He is...corpse-like and monstrous. The few humans he does stumble across scream at the sight of him. Some shoot.

It’s easier to lock himself away.

So he drinks. He sleeps. He forgets the world outside and it forgets him just the same.

_____

The first few decades are the most difficult. Later, he will learn the name for his condition. The people of the Commonwealth refer to him as a ghoul, an aftereffect of the freshly irradiated world. The body was capable enough of change. It’s the mind that’s more...tenuous.

Most ghouls went mad. There were a variety of causes: the radiation fried your brain. The self loathing. The suicidal thoughts. The dissociation. Truly, the mind boggled. He thinks it’s a hint of everything. He hates this new body. He hates this new world.

It’s easier to wrap himself in his memories. Aera is still there. They still live in their house outside of Salem. She’s still heavy with child and...the clouds have yet to settle over their life. He still wakes up every morning with her head pillowed on his chest and her leg hooked over his hips. He’ll listen to her soft snores (no one would believe her capable of it; he knows better) and they will chase him back to sleep. He’d rather languor in his past then resign to the present silence.

Years pass. Decades pass.

And then one century and then another.

_____

The earth...never recovers in the strictest sense of the word. It adapts. Life returns. Strange, mutated, creatures roam the streets of Boston. Some of them he recognizes. There are still humans. There are more ghouls.

He is far more comfortable with the latter.

A gentleman named John Hancock comes calling for him one evening. Despite the severity of his condition, John carries himself with all manner of aplomb. He sweeps a ridiculous tricorn hat from his head, drops into an exaggerated bow. Ardyn scoffs, inwardly delighted. It’s been decades since he was treated to such theatrics. He’s missed the levity.

“It ain’t much but it could be,” John fumbles with a tin of mentats. After a moment's consideration, he holds it out to his fellow ghoul. Ardyn waves him off. “Real uh...well, sanctuary sounds like some hippy shit. But a good place for freaks like us to get some much needed r&r.”

“You’re intending to build a town?”

“Naw. Naw. Buildings are already there. We throw up some walls. Get some people. Bingo. Got yourself a community.”

“I fail to see what I would contribute to such an endeavor.”

John shrugs. He knows the broad strokes of the ghouls life; by traditional standards, he’s not a good man. Here, in this new world, some leniencies can be made. He’s trying. He wants to help, junkie, killer, or otherwise. John fumbles around in his pockets until he finds a crumpled cigarette, “Eh, maybe ya don’t add anything. Lots of those types out there too. But c’mon, man, its gotta beat holin’ up in this dump waiting to go feral.” Which...is true.

He doesn’t give John an answer that night.

It’s another year before he finally makes the move to Goodneighbor.

_____

One of the other ghouls suggests he take up a hobby. Something to take his mind off his condition and keep him from wallowing in the past. He reclaims an old building on the outskirts of town, tucked away in one of the smaller alleys. Before the loss of his wife and the drink, he’d quite enjoyed his position at the university.

“I dunno.” It’s all John will say. Ardyn has little room to judge but the other ghoul is woefully expressive when he speaks. He swings his arms out wide, a healthy plume of smoke trailing behind his cigar. Ardyn winces. Aged papers are scattered across more than a dozen desks. It doesn’t take an active imagination to see the place going up in flames. “Library ain’t really what I had in mind. Little more...Diamond City if you catch my drift.”

“To the contrary. I dare say your goons might benefit with a little exposure to higher learning.”

“Hey. I don’t need clever trigger boys. Smart men get ideas. Ideas…”

“...get people killed. Yes, I’m aware.”

John shakes his head. Takes another drag and exhales a rasping chuckle. “Fuckin’ library. Shoulda figured.”

“Perhaps,” he says, dryly. A spark drifts on a nonexistent breeze and Ardyn lurches forward, snatching the cigar from the mayor’s hand. He snuffs it out. “But someone has to do it. Why not me?”

“Yeah. Why not you, buddy?” John grins. He tips his tricorn and saunters back out into the street, whistling to himself. It is an entirely unremarkable interaction and...somehow more thrilling for it. For the first time in too long, Ardyn feels...vaguely human.

_____

He collects books.

He helps John negotiate a few...profitable arrangements with the triggermen.

He finds bits and pieces of the old world and brings them back to his home.

Little by little, he feels more like himself.

______

The world ends on October 23, 2077. He is thirty three years old when the bombs fall. He’s barely thirty four when radiation ravages his body, transforming it forever. He drifts through the next two centuries. He begins to heal.

Life begins again two hundred and ten years later to the day. It’s a tedious cliche but he’ll commit to it regardless. The bell above the library door chimes. He glances up from his reading and comes eye to eye with two humans. The young man is scowling, grumbling to himself as he struggles to balance an armful of books.

And the young woman is familiar enough that he might as well be staring at a ghost.

She smiles at him, soft, hesitant, clearly taken aback by his appearance but unwilling to relent.

October 23, 2287 marks the day Lunafreya Nox Fleuret and Noctis Lucius Caelum stumble into his life.

#ffxv fanfic #fallout 4 fic #ardyn izunia #prior aerdyn #my fic #hideous cracky crossovers #Ghoul ardyn is a good boy who collects books and scarves #he is soft and he loves exactly two smooth skins #Blame Lem #Ghouldyn Au

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techcrunchappcom · 4 years ago

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New Post has been published on https://techcrunchapp.com/annexation-simmers-coronavirus-rages-and-netanyahus-busy-mulling-an-early-election-haaretz/

Annexation simmers, coronavirus rages – and Netanyahu’s busy mulling an early election - Haaretz

The silence with which July 1 passed, without the sovereign power annexing a single windblown West Bank hilltop and without the security cabinet holding even a symbolic meeting, was the epitome of an anticlimax. It wasn’t the beating wings of history that were heard throughout the Middle East, but the desperate attempts of a duck trying to take off from a lake.

15דלגו 15 שניות קדימה

<![CDATA[ .htz-loader-circle -webkit-transform-origin:center center; transform-origin:center center; -webkit-animation:htz-loader-animation 1.5s infinite linear; animation:htz-loader-animation 1.5s infinite linear @-webkit-keyframes htz-loader-animation 0% -webkit-transform:rotate(0); transform:rotate(0) 100% -webkit-transform:rotate(-360deg); transform:rotate(-360deg) @keyframes htz-loader-animation 0% -webkit-transform:rotate(0); transform:rotate(0) 100% -webkit-transform:rotate(-360deg); transform:rotate(-360deg) ]]>

לחצו כדי לנגן

15דלגו 15 שניות אחורה

1xלחצו כדי לשנות את מהירות הניגון מ-1 ל-1

0:00

— : —

LISTEN: Bibi’s bonanza, arresting activists and the death of God TVCredit: Haaretz

In January, when he arrogantly descended from the dais he shared with Donald Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu rushed to declare that a decision on applying sovereignty to parts of the West Bank would be brought to the cabinet that very Sunday. The settlers danced on the rocky hills of Samaria and in the streets of Washington. The harbingers of redemption blinded the national eyes.

But since then, nothing. Only the drawing of maps.

Avi Berkowitz, the young envoy sent by Trump and his son-in-law Jared Kushner (“a child sent by a child,” according to a senior Israeli official familiar with the ups and downs of annexation), arrived Saturday night and left Wednesday. He left behind a list of demands for “significant diplomatic quid pro quos” – as Netanyahu put it in private conversations – that Israel must give the Palestinians.

The U.S. administration isn’t where it was in January. A diplomatic source described this to me as follows, riffing on the saying about the failures of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations: The maximum that Netanyahu thinks he can give, from a political standpoint, is currently less than the minimum the Americans are demanding.

The words “Netanyahu” and “giving,” as we all know, don’t usually go together, despite the similarity of their Hebrew spellings (netinah for giving). The prime minister is the type who always insists on a free ride and then demands change from the driver at the last stop. Any concession – like reclassifying part of Area C, the section of the West Bank assigned full Israeli control by the Oslo Accords, as Area B, where Israel retains security control but the Palestinians have civilian control – would run into heavy resistance on the right.

For three years, Trump’s people worked on their plan with Netanyahu and his people – or alternatively, as some say, at Netanyahu’s direction. But almost six months after its unveiling, the plan has gone back to the drawing board, and perhaps onto the ash heap of history.

Trump gives his gifts capriciously, in spurts. Nobody in Jerusalem really knew when or why he would keep his promises, like moving the embassy to Jerusalem or withdrawing from the nuclear deal with Iran. In terms of timing, both of these came as a surprise. They also put him odds with most of his administration and, of course, weren’t preceded by any staff work.

Now, when he’s trailing far behind Joe Biden in the polls and the coronavirus is battering the United States mercilessly – including a significant worsening in red states that were supposed to be in Trump’s pocket – it’s hard to get hold of him to settle the annexation issue. The hills of Judea are crying out for tidings, but Trump Hill isn’t answering.

That’s also what Netanyahu explains to people on the right who are pushing him to annex. The White House’s attention isn’t focused on Israel, he says, but on the coronavirus, the economy, domestic problems, the U.S. elections and the flood tide against Trump in the polls. The momentum has been lost.

Cabinet members from Netanyahu’s Likud party who are in regular contact with Bibi about their ministries’ affairs say that during their meetings, he’s never the one to bring up the annexation issue. As one minister put it, “If the media weren’t preoccupied with the issue, I wouldn’t even know there was such a thing.”

Since the Americans left, the prime minister has sounded pessimistic and skeptical about the chances of annexation, Netanyahu’s interlocutors say. He still believes he can extract something significant from Washington, but the pitfalls are vast. Until he gets an answer from the Americans – and who knows when that will be – he won’t do anything.

Open gallery view

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu posing for a picture at a Jerusalem hotel, June 2020. Credit: Ohad Zwigenberg

Roadside budget bomb

Netanyahu is keeping two balls in the air – applying sovereignty and passing the state budget. Ostensibly, there’s no connection between the two, but actually there is, big-time. If the first ball falls, he’ll use the second to try to break up the government and call a new election, while blaming the failure of annexation on Benny Gantz’s Kahol Lavan party.

Gantz and his partner in the party’s leadership, Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi, will wear this disgrace proudly. It’s exactly what the center-left bloc expects them to do. Not only is the prime minister holding “discreet” talks with the Americans, so are the defense and foreign ministers, and their influence has been felt in the talks with Berkowitz.

If Netanyahu nevertheless gets a green light from Washington to apply sovereignty anywhere, and he does so, he still has his second roadside bomb, the budget. The deadline for getting the budget through the Knesset is August 28, 100 days after the government was sworn in. Failure to pass it means the Knesset will automatically dissolve and an election will be held within three months, during which Netanyahu will head a caretaker government. If the government falls for any other reason, Gantz will head the caretaker government.

Holding an election in late November, when the seasonal flu and the coronavirus will both be running rampant and the hospitals will be overflowing, sounds insane. So an election would likely be postponed, and postponed again, and yet again. And during all that time, guess who would be prime minister?

Calling an election while simultaneously postponing it, a maneuver that would halt any political momentum that might threaten Netanyahu, fits Bibi the way tanning beds and carrot oil fit his favorite American president. Still, the Likud chief fears the unknown as he stands on the edge of the cliff of the coronavirus era and the economic crisis.

In a closed meeting this week, he was quoted as saying, “My opponent in the election will be neither the opposition nor the remnants of Kahol Lavan. They don’t worry me. The truly difficult opponent will be the coronavirus.”

A Kahol Lavan minister told me this week that so far, Gantz has insisted on a two-year budget running through the end of 2021, as stipulated by the party’s coalition agreement with Likud. “But I’m not convinced we won’t ultimately be persuaded into the budget Netanyahu seeks,” the minister added. “Annexation is a disaster. A four-month budget isn’t a disaster; it’s just silly. If we agree, we’ll demand something in exchange.”

“What?” I asked.

“For instance, waiting to annex until after the U.S. presidential election in November.”

“In other words, never,” I said.

“We’ll see.”

Open gallery view

Defense Minister Benny Gantz in Jerusalem, June 16, 2020.Credit: Ohad Zwigenberg

He regrets to inform you

Netanyahu’s weekly statement at the start of the cabinet meeting Sunday opened with an expression of regret. “The timing of the Finance Committee’s discussion was wrong,” the “economic cripple” said, referring to the Knesset panel’s decision to grant him special tax breaks. “I regret this.”

Veteran ministers exchanged stunned looks. The last time they remember their leader in a conciliatory mood after a weekend in the bosom of his family was, well, never.

That isn’t the mood at the prime minister’s residence. Forty-eight hours with his wife Sara and son Yair always stir up the anger and contentiousness. (“When I needed him for something important,” a former senior aide once said, “I would wait at least until Tuesday, when he’d be calmer.”)

He apparently didn’t brief Likud legislator Miki Zohar on the new tack. Zohar continued complaining this week about his boss’ miserably low income and the fact that the law doesn’t let him moonlight.

It’s not clear whether Zohar actually wants the prime minister to look for sidelines, but his statement was inaccurate. Even while in office, Netanyahu definitely received a nice income plus many other benefits, ranging from cigars to peak profits on dubious stock deals.

The next day, influenced by a Channel 12 poll showing a near 20 percent tumble in support for his handling of the coronavirus crisis, Netanyahu told Likud legislators he intends to focus more on the economy. But he didn’t specify which economy he meant. The day after that, it once again became clear he meant his household economy.

The pretext, of course, was his corruption trial – and Attorney General Avichai Mendelblit. An opinion submitted by the latter to the State Comptroller’s Office, saying that Netanyahu couldn’t accept a corrupt gift of 10 million shekels ($2.9 million) from a prosecution witness in his case, sparked a furious outburst from the prime minister’s family. This was expressed in disturbed tweetstorms by him and his son.

News broadcasts Tuesday were once again full of heartrending stories about the collapsing unemployed and self-employed, about parents who can’t put a hot supper on the table. At the very same time, Netanyahu was bombarding social media with a double-digit number of tweets in just a few hours, all consisting of smears and incitement against Mendelblit and lamentations over the millions denied him (though he’s already a multimillionaire).

Exactly one week after his fatal error in the Finance Committee, he had already returned to his violent, egoistic element, despite the polls showing that even his fans want to hear something else. They’d like to know how “the world’s No. 1 country in dealing with the coronavirus” has once again become a health catastrophe – persona non grata in countries that are opening their borders to tourists. They’d like to understand how he’ll get us out of the economic hole he created.

If not solutions, they’d at least like attempts. And if not concrete measures, then at least empathy.

And when he isn’t preoccupied with his trial, he’s busy with that crazy annexation. If it actually happens, even in a slimmed-down version, the aftermath is likely to deal another mortal blow to our collapsing economy, which is already on a ventilator and the verge of an induced coma.

Applying sovereignty won’t provide work for a single unemployed person or prevent a single bankruptcy. But the settlers – some of them – will applaud him, and he’ll finally have a “legacy” that doesn’t reek of corruption, incitement and hate-mongering.

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Attorney General Avichai Mendelblit at Tel Aviv University, January 28, 2020.Credit: Ofer Vaknin

Gantz sees the light

Gantz squeezed his way through that narrow crack this week, albeit with typical hesitancy and awkwardness. After five weeks of tiptoeing quietly and politely around Netanyahu, as if he were a British butler in the service of a cranky lord, he finally realized where he was living. And with whom.

His basic decency, willingness to cooperate and desire not to rock the boat so that the rotation of the prime minister’s job won’t fall from the deck gave way to a grasp of reality. And the situation isn’t easy.

The penny dropped at the cabinet meeting, when Netanyahu prevented Gantz from saying a few alternative words to the media after the prime minister was through. After Gantz protested to Netanyahu’s chief of staff, Asher Hayoun, who got caught in the line of fire, Netanyahu growled, “He can talk later,” and shrugged his shoulders with contempt.

When Hayoun tried to salvage something from the situation, Gantz replied sardonically, “It’s okay, I understand,” and put his face mask back on. His eyes strayed to some far-off point in the room as if he had seen the light.

He gets the picture. The fact that Netanyahu, the great champion of two-year budgets, is insisting on approving a new budget for just four months is a transparent maneuver to deprive Gantz of his turn as prime minister.

The Kahol Lavan chief now understands that the way the coalition agreement is implemented doesn’t depend on him. Even more, he understands that his limp-wristed behavior has driven away more than half the voters who remained with him after his split with Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid. He realizes that even the last remnants, the voters represented in the pathetic nine Knesset seats predicted by one recent poll, expect him – through his actions but also through tough talking – to justify his pretext for entering the government: tackling the coronavirus crisis.

Between attending to his in-box as defense minister and the thought that if he regularly serves pounds of flesh to the constantly hungry lion he’ll be able to succeed him on the savannah in November 2021, Gantz has grasped his mistakes. He had forgotten that he represents a bloc, something Netanyahu never forgets.

When journalists publish investigative reports, Netanyahu screams that they’re trying to topple the right-wing government. When an indictment is filed against him, he shrieks about a “governmental coup.” When decisions that don’t suit him are made, he accuses the decision-maker of joining the left.

Gantz, in his new incarnation, is already running a kind of election campaign. If Netanyahu is heading toward an election, whether sooner or later, then fine, let’s hold one right now.

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Benny Gantz, left, and Benjamin Netanyahu during a cabinet meeting in Jerusalem, May 31, 2020.Credit: Emil Salman

Gantz leaked his statement to the American peace team that annexation should wait until after the virus has passed. He responded quickly to the political arrest of a retired general, Amir Haskel, during a protest, hinting that the government sought to limit the right to demonstrate.

He – with Ashkenazi and Justice Minister Avi Nissenkorn – came quickly to Mendelblit’s defense against Netanyahu. To confront Bibi’s mouthpieces and the attorney general’s despisers in the media, they should also have highlighted Judge David Rozen’s report, which demolished all the tendentious, irresponsible media reports about Mendelblit.

Gantz is starting to talk about the economy and the coronavirus, the coronavirus and the economy. So are his ministers. That’s exactly what his base expects to hear.

He’s also doing something else. While one hand is disengaging from Netanyahu’s caresses and displaying signs of independent movement, the other pulled out a sword this week and brandished it in a different direction, at Lapid.

In a series of social media posts, Kahol Lavan attacked the Yesh Atid chairman no less brutally than the latter attacked his ex, Gantz, when Gantz joined forces with Netanyahu. Gantz knows very well where his precious lost Knesset seats have gone. But the question is, have they been lost forever? Apparently, the answer is yes.

After all, there are words but no initiatives, no actions, no clear direction. There’s no clear doctrine. He should learn from Naftali Bennett, whose right-wing Yamina alliance has soared in the polls, doubling its strength.

Health Minister Yuli Edelstein is buried in his ministry’s affairs and in spats around the powerless coronavirus cabinet’s table. Finance Minister Yisrael Katz watches Netanyahu stealing credit for the few decisions Katz has made to benefit ordinary people, and he spends the rest of his time making his way through the angry demonstrators outside both his home and his office.

Meanwhile, the shadow minister for health and economic affairs alike – Bennett – is dogging them both. He is searing on TV and radio, has put out a flood of proposals and launched an “economic journey” among businesses around the country.

His seemingly authentic concern for the unemployed masses, the tens of thousands of closed businesses and the newly poor has made him the only representative of a collapsing, desperate constituency. Bennett has chosen two catchphrases – “making a living” and “bread.” At a time of crisis, even a high-tech tycoon and sworn capitalist can build on a social-justice arsenal.

Bennett has been crafting plans for fighting the virus while also addressing the economic ills it has caused. That’s exactly what Gantz should have been doing from day one in the government.

“So what happened, Benny decided to die on his feet?” I asked one of his ministers.

“I’m not saying we won’t die,” he replied honestly. “But hold off on the eulogies for a little while.”

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Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah during the coronavirus crisis, June 15, 2020.Credit: Mohamad Torokman / Reuters

Sweat in August

Two presidents, one from an important, friendly country in Europe, and one from the Palestinian Authority, spoke over the past 10 days with Israeli officials. The first, a devoted fan of Israel, spoke with all his heart.

“You want so much to be Europe,” he told his interlocutor. “You want to be a part of us in soccer and basketball, and Eurovision, of course. The trade between us is breaking records. You expect us to support your diplomatic war against Iran. You come to us with demands to back you at the UN, and what don’t you ask for? But when you take such a dramatic step, you don’t even talk to us.”

Speaking in a different tone and to a different person, Mahmoud Abbas mocked Netanyahu’s shows of self-promotion around the coronavirus. “Your prime minister portrayed himself as a magician who beat the virus,” he said. “He claimed that world leaders were phoning him to learn how to fight the virus. If he’s such a magician with 300 dead, what am I with five?”

The death toll in Israel had hit 326 by midday Friday and 12 among the Palestinians in the West Bank. I have no idea what Abbas’ government has done in the past two months to prepare for the second wave, but no doubt the Israeli government vacillated, and the swapping of ministers and bureaucrats as well as a lack of coordination among the agencies fighting the virus created confusion.

The only clear voice throughout this period was that of the supreme leader raging against those bastard conspirators who concocted baseless indictments – under leftist pressure, of course.

Israel hasn’t created an effective testing system for breaking the chain of infection. It hasn’t improved its system of epidemiological investigations. It hasn’t prepared a plan as it would for a war. It hasn’t recruited thousands of students and taught them how to examine patients. It hasn’t backed up the labs.

The success of the first phase of the crisis was rightfully attributed to Netanyahu – and the painful failure now. “I directed the biological institute to find a vaccine,” the prime minister announced. “I ordered them to cut the time for receiving test results to 12 hours,” he declared. “I agreed with Cyprus and Greece to renew flights on August 1,” he informed us.

Maybe one day historians will write about the vaccine developed in record time thanks to him, of the speedy tests that broke the chain of infection, of the hundreds of thousands of Israelis who chilled out abroad in the summer of 2020. Until then, we’ll be counting the thousands of new patients, and we’ll be sweating in the Israeli furnace that is August. All of us together, without exception.

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