Israel: Pure right wing government is a complete disaster

Dr. Micah Goodman, the Israeli philosopher, and founder of the Ein Prat pre-army preparatory program, has a surprisingly optimistic assessment of the future of Israel, even in the midst of the breakdown of unity that the judicial reform has fostered since initiated earlier this year.

Goodman is opposed to the judicial overhaul. He’s under no illusions that as long as this coalition remains in power, the coming years will likely be an ongoing hellscape of unilateral attempts at grabbing power and abusing minority rights, countered by continued civil insurrection.

Goodman says, when this coalition is no longer in power – and that day will come, if not tomorrow, when elections are called again – Israel that emerges will be profoundly changed. The processes that have fueled the outrage will lead to a new age of realism. 

Israel is about to go through a very similar experience that led to the collapse of the Left following the deadly years of the Second Intifada.

“This very extreme government was, for many years, a fantasy among circles of the Right,” says Goodman. “This fantasy has a name in Hebrew, memshelet yamin al-male, basically, a pure right-wing government. And this fantasy was very helpful for the Right because it was a great answer to a question ‘You’re in government for 40 years – why isn’t Israel the paradise you promised us it’s going to be? Why are there still traffic jams, security issues, economic issues?’”

The Right’s answer, “Well, we were never really in power. We always had a centrist or a liberal there to neutralize our power, to block us, to stop us from doing what we think we should do. [But] one day we’ll get what we want. We’ll have a massive majority. We won’t have to join with any centrist in the coalition. We’ll have a pure right-wing government, and then you’ll see what Israel will look like.’”

The long-awaited right-wing government has been a total disaster.

Most Israelis would agree – including many on the Right – that it’s been a complete and total disaster. 

The way changes to the judiciary have been pushed through without compromise or conversation; the hateful statements emanating from coalition leaders’ mouths on a daily basis; the branding of Israel’s most patriotic citizens as traitors, refuseniks, and anarchists; the growing police brutality; the economic and diplomatic devastation – all of these, Goodman says, show what a fully right-wing government is really like.

Fifty-four percent of Israelis say they oppose the recently passed law canceling the court’s ability to apply a reasonableness standard. That may seem like a slim majority, but it is 20 points higher than those who support it. 

Going forward, just 16% of Israelis want the government to legislate without an agreement.

The mask has been ripped off, and the fantasy has been shown to be untenable. Goodman says, is not unlike the 1990s when a similar fantasy – that of the Left – had us believing we’d soon be driving to Damascus for hummus.

“The best way to destroy a fantasy is to implement it,” Goodman says. “And now we’re living the fantasy, we’re living the dream. And many people… including on the Right, including Religious Zionists, including Likud voters…this does not look to them like a utopia. This looks to them like a dystopia.”

And what happens “the day after this government is over?” Goodman asks. “The idea of a pure extreme right-wing government will not be a fantasy. It will be a bad memory.”

Wouldn’t it be better to get to that point without having to create a balance of trauma in the meantime? But the Left has long been eviscerated. For healing to occur, the fantasies of the extreme Right must share the same fate. Only out of such mutual disillusionment can a true center arise. 

“Many people on the Right will not want to replicate this experiment,” Goodman asserts.

Goodman isn’t dismissing the idealism of either the Left or the Right. But “when you fall in love with an idea, you become blind to reality. You love the ideology. You really want it to become a reality. So, you don’t listen to reality itself.”

Does this mean the Right will soon disappear like the Left in this country? Not quite, Goodman says. What will be off the table in the future, though, is “a coalition with the extreme Right.” (Ditto for the extreme Left – not that it has any power these days.)

 “We needed judicial reform,” writes Daniel Gordis on his Substack page. “Almost everyone knows that.” (Polls have shown that some 60% to 70% of Israelis are in favor of some sort of change to the judiciary.) “But we needed unity more than that. We could have had both.”

“Sustaining mass mobilization, particularly in the face of intensifying repression,” writes Maria J. Stephan, who co-authored Why Civil Resistance Works, The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict, requires investment in organizing infrastructure, training, and a commitment to nonviolent discipline.

Getting there won’t be easy. But for the first time in weeks – months, really – I feel just the teensiest bit better about the future of Israel.

Courtesy: The Jerusalem Post

Israel Settlers considering returning to their countries of origin

According to a survey more than a quarter of Israelis in the occupied Palestinian territories are considering returning to their countries of origin. The survey comes as credit rating agencies reported that the mounting domestic uncertainty will reduce Israel's economic growth this year. 

The Times of Israel has cited a poll conducted by the regime's channel 13 as saying 28% of respondents were weighing a move abroad while an additional 8% were unsure.

“The survey reflected the impact of the coalition passing the law, despite sustained mass protests, vehement opposition from top judicial, security, economic and public figures, and thousands of Israeli military reservists vowing to quit service,” the newspaper reported.

Highlighting the strong opposition against Netanyahu's cabinet and signs of protests to continue, only 33% respondents said they believe the Israeli prime minister's claim that he wants to compromise on the rest of the judicial overhaul law. 

Among other aspects that the poll found was that 54% of Israelis fear that the judicial overhaul will harm the security of the occupation regime.

Another 56% said that they were worried about a civil war erupting between opponents and supporters of Netanyahu's cabinet judicial reforms. 

The newspaper, also citing the same poll, indicated that “Gantz’s National Unity party would win 30 seats in the 120-seat Knesset, the most of any party, if elections were held today, surpassing Likud, which ranked next with 25 seats.”

Netanyahu - who is facing corruption charges - has resisted pressure from the occupation's staunchest allies, including the United States, which is looking with concern at the crisis unfolding in the occupied Palestinian territories, to drop his judicial overhaul measures.

The plan has also seen the biggest polarization among Israeli settlers in the regime's history with more than seven months of mass protests that saw violent clashes between the Israeli police and settlers after Netanyahu passed the bill on July 24. 

It comes as protests against the bill saw a forum of around 150 of the regime's largest companies holding a strike on Monday. Two of the largest Israeli malls also closed the stores in their shopping centers. 

Israeli President Isaac Herzog and the head of the occupation’s largest labor union failed to mediate a compromise between the coalition and opposition ahead of the vote in a bid to ease the crisis. 

After news emerged that the compromise talks had collapsed the early gains for the Israeli currency were and sent the shekel weaker, with losses deepening further after the vote.

In a sign that the situation could get worse, the head of Israel's Histadrut labor federation has declared that he will be consulting with union officials about declaring a general strike.

"From this moment on, any unilateral progress in the reform will have serious consequences ... Either things will progress with broad agreement, or they will not progress at all," he said.

That has all sent Israeli financial markets tumbling with economists predicting there could also be an effect on inflation and interest rates. 

The shekel has weakened by around ten percent versus the dollar since late January, when the cabinet unveiled its controversial judicial overhaul plan, which harmed foreign inflows.

A report on Thursday by the S&P Global Ratings said the controversy over Netanyahu’s plans to limit the powers of the judiciary is increasing domestic political uncertainty and will lead to lower economic growth for the entity this year. 

"If government and opposition do not achieve an agreement on the topic, this could further exacerbate domestic political confrontation and weigh on medium-term economic growth," S&P said. 

With a deep divide in Israeli society and strained loyalties by thousands of army reservists and foreign investors have been left frightened.

Political watchdog groups have appealed to the Supreme Court to overturn a new law passed by parliament in the first of the changes to trim Supreme Court powers, paving the way to a showdown among branches of government when it hears the arguments in September.

Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, a strong supporter of the judicial changes, pinned the blame on the Israeli protesters and not the cabinet for the warning by the rating agencies.

"S&P, like Moody's ... does not warn of damage to the economy due to the legal reform, but because of the protest that creates instability," Smotrich said in a statement.

S&P said that its ratings for the regime have in the past been consistently constrained by domestic and regional political and security risks. 

Israel, it added, has a history of frequent elections and changes in cabinet composition, which makes future policy direction harder to predict.

The calls by Israeli settlers and unions for further strikes, in addition to more than 10,000 reservists joining the protest movement, have split the regime. 

Experts believe the economic outlook is likely to slow further, adding more fuel for settlers to leave the occupied Palestinian territories where they fear of the possibility of a civil war amid a rise in violent protests on one hand and the increasing retaliatory operations

carried out by the resistance on the other. These have added to the woes of their security concerns. 

On Friday, the Israeli Air Force chief warned that enemies may exploit the internal crisis, saying his forces need to remain vigilant and prepared.

Tomer Bar said, "It is possible that at a time like this, they (Israel's enemies) will try to test the frontiers, our cohesion, and our alertness," he said without elaborating. 

As the crisis escalated further after the July 24 vote, Israeli media have reported that Netanyahu had received at least four letters from the regime's military intelligence warning of serious security ramifications and historic weaknesses as a result of his judicial overhaul measures.
 

 

Israel: Protestors target Netanyahu and visiting Pentagon chief at airport

Israelis protesting judicial reforms sought by the hard-right government converged on the country's main airport on Thursday in a bid to disrupt a trip abroad by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as well as a visit by the US defense secretary.

Defying a heavy police deployment, convoys of cars flying blue-and-white national flags packed the Tel Aviv-Jerusalem highway and streamed toward Ben Gurion Airport's main terminal.

Some local media said Netanyahu and his retinue sidestepped the traffic jams by coming to the airport in the early morning. Others speculated that he might reach Ben Gurion - usually a 30-minute drive from Jerusalem - by military helicopter instead.

Netanyahu's spokespeople did not disclose the whereabouts of the prime minister, who was due to leave for a two-day visit to Rome in the afternoon after a hastily organized welcome for Pentagon chief Lloyd Austin, who landed at the airport at noon.

Images on social media showed Netanyahu aides shopping in Duty Free. Outside, some travellers abandoned blocked vehicles and walked along the highway shoulder to Ben Gurion, luggage in tow.

Protest organizers called for escalated disruptions throughout the country in what they dubbed "A Day of Resistance" against reforms that they fear would subordinate Israel's Supreme Court to the executive and foster corruption.

Netanyahu - who is on trial on graft charges he denies - argues that curbing the judiciary would restore the balance between the branches of government.

"Nobody said don't protest," minister for police Itamar Ben-Gvir told reporters at the airport, where he was coordinating the response to the demonstrations. "But it's not okay, it's not right, it's not proper to ruin the lives of 70,000 people."

He appeared to be referring to people stuck in traffic as well as those travelling through Ben Gurion, whose spokesperson said the expected passenger volume for Thursday was 65,000.

In a message circulated over WhatsApp, protest organizers had urged air travellers to check in ahead of time, "We are trying to balance our desire to shake up the country with the necessity of enabling people to reach their destinations."

Austin, who is on a regional tour, had been due to arrive on Wednesday. But he postponed, and relocated meetings to a venue near Ben Gurion, given concerns that the demonstrations could make it difficult to reach the Defence Ministry in Tel Aviv.

Though it has yet to be written into law, the judicial overhaul plan has hit the shekel and stirred concern abroad for Israel's democratic health. Polls have found that most Israelis want it shelved or amended to satisfy a national consensus.

Two law professors, Yuval Elbashan and Daniel Friedman, this week circulated a compromise proposal. Netanyahu's cabinet secretary and two ministers gave the draft a preliminary welcome. But leaders of the opposition said they would not countenance it unless Netanyahu suspends ratification votes.

In Jerusalem, a group of protesters used sandbags and barbed wired to barricade the offices of the Kohelet Policy Forum, a think-tank that has advocated the government reforms.