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Netanyahu’s election video casts Erdoğan, Khamenei, Abbas and Mamdani as enemies
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu released an artificial intelligence-generated video ahead of the Oct. 27 elections portraying President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Iranian leader Mojtaba Khamenei, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani as part of the same enemy camp. As the war in Gaza and regional tensions continue, the video frames the election contest around Netanyahu’s security narrative.
An artificial intelligence-generated video posted on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s official X account portrays President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Iranian leader Mojtaba Khamenei, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani as members of the same enemy camp ahead of the elections scheduled for Oct. 27.
The video shows the actors preparing to celebrate Netanyahu’s election defeat. Their celebration ends when it becomes clear that Netanyahu will win. Professor Tuğçe Ersoy Ceylan says the scenario equates Netanyahu’s defeat with the victory of these actors and ties the election race to the leader’s security credentials, moving it away from the government’s performance.
The Gaza war at the center of the election narrative
Israel is heading to the polls after a Knesset term that completed its full four-year mandate for the first time since 1988. Ceylan says the coalition of far-right, ultra-Orthodox and religious Zionist parties led by Netanyahu has remained in power less because of policies that satisfy the public than because of the wartime environment that began in Gaza after Oct. 7 and spread across the region.
One strand of Netanyahu’s campaign is based on an effort to evade responsibility for Oct. 7. The other seeks to build a new politics of enmity through AI-generated videos and similar images.
This approach is seen as a continuation of a billboard campaign launched in August. The first campaign featured Khamenei, Erdoğan, Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem and Mamdani, urging voters to vote against those who wanted Netanyahu to lose. In the new video, Mahmoud Abbas replaces Naim Qassem.
Erdoğan, Khamenei, Abbas and Mamdani placed in the same threat category
Ceylan says Netanyahu is not creating a new enemy so much as establishing equivalence among existing and potential adversaries. The Iranian leader, the president of Türkiye, the head of the Palestinian Authority and a democratically elected American mayor are presented within the same security category.
The narrative in the video brings together threats against Israel and political and legal criticism directed at Netanyahu under a single heading. The threat is defined through opposition to Netanyahu, regardless of the actors’ actual capabilities or intentions.
Tensions between Türkiye and Israel have become personalized around Gaza, Syria and the competition for regional influence. Türkiye’s call for Netanyahu to be held accountable and its political support for the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrant for Netanyahu are also presented as elements of this tension.
Mamdani’s criticism of Netanyahu is also placed on the same level in the video as the security threat attributed to Iran and Hezbollah. Erdoğan and Mamdani are thus recast from foreign politicians who criticize Netanyahu as the regional and American extensions of Israel’s enemy camp.
Linking domestic opposition to external threats
Israeli opposition leaders do not appear in the video. Ceylan says, however, that the campaign’s primary political target may be the domestic opposition, which is not shown directly.
The narrative suggests that Erdoğan, Khamenei, Abbas and Mamdani want Netanyahu to lose and that the Israeli opposition supports the same outcome. It conveys the message that the opposition’s rise to power would serve Israel’s adversaries.
This strategy blurs the line between legitimate opposition and disloyalty to the country. Netanyahu’s continued leadership is equated with Israel’s protection, while an election defeat is presented as a national defeat.
Criticism of the narrative
Ceylan says it is not possible to claim that Netanyahu’s campaign has been accepted across Israeli society. Criticism of the AI-generated video and the August billboard campaign has not come only from left-liberal circles. An opinion piece in the right-leaning Israel Hayom also argued that Likud was looking for enemies in order to survive the election.
Naama Lazimi, a lawmaker from the opposition Democrats Party, responded to the August billboard campaign with a parody. In the parody, the figures were replaced by people criticized over their ties to Qatar in Netanyahu’s inner circle.
Despite dissatisfaction with the government, Netanyahu has not completely lost his claim to security leadership. In a Channel 12 poll dated Sept. 7, former Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot led Netanyahu by 42% to 35% in suitability to serve as prime minister, according to data from the Midgam Institute.
Different polls show the gap between the blocs shifting and indicate that Netanyahu’s bloc cannot guarantee a majority. This picture suggests that the campaign is drawing strength not from a solid Netanyahu majority but from a polarized and volatile electoral environment.
The role of the AI video in the election
Ceylan says the visuals and videos aim to mobilize right-wing voters’ perception of threat, increase turnout and strengthen loyalty to the bloc. This method shifts the election away from responsibility for Oct. 7, the cost of the war, the hostages and international isolation.
The AI-generated video presents Netanyahu’s confrontation with numerous enemies not as evidence of failure but as proof that he can stand up to these actors. It also seeks to reduce the risk of vote splitting among right-wing parties hovering around the electoral threshold by suggesting that such a split would benefit the enemy.
Within this framework, opposition to Netanyahu is equated with opposition to Israel and the legitimacy of the opposition is undermined. Different political, diplomatic, legal and military actors are grouped into a single threat category.
Ceylan says that although the technology is new, the political method is rooted in an old approach: equating the leader’s fate with the nation’s fate, turning the external enemy into the arbiter of domestic competition and presenting an election defeat as a national defeat. The central issue is therefore not only the authenticity of the AI-generated images but also the presentation of distinct actors as a single, unified threat.
Source: Anadolu Ajansı
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