Israel’s Opposition Offers Little Alternative
The increasing rush to the right in Israel includes not just the current ruling coalition but most of the opposition as well.
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Israel’s Opposition Offers Little Alternative
With today’s passage of the so-called “reasonableness bill,” the Knesset has removed a key brake on its own power, as the High Court will no longer be able to void Knesset decisions that exceed, in its judgment, the standards of its own definitions of democratic and political norms. To be sure, this was an inadequate system—the right wing is not wrong when it says that a judicial body not elected by the people should not be able to pass such judgments free of some sort of constitutional criteria.
But simply removing it does not address that problem, it makes it worse, by a lot. Remember, the Knesset is a single governmental unit, and it includes not only legislators but usually also the cabinet, ministers, and the prime minister himself. With simple majority rule in the Knesset, it’s not hard to see why so many Israelis are concerned about what this means for their democracy.
But let’s recall, that the “democracy” they are fighting for is not actually democracy in any real sense of the word. It is no more democratic than Athens was, when it excluded women, slaves, freed slaves, and foreign residents. It is no more democratic than the initial vision of most of the United States’ so-called “founding fathers” which also excluded women, slaves, freedmen, and those who did not own land or could not pay a poll tax. The Israeli democracy that was at issue here was a Jewish democracy, where Palestinian citizens are denied equal rights in many ways and Palestinian non-citizens have no rights at all.
That’s why, in the wake of the passage of the “reasonableness bill” it is so important that we understand the character of the state of Israel that brought this day about. We have heard a great deal about the current governing coalition, which controls 64 seats in the 120-seat Knesset. The size and scope of the protests that have been taking place since the beginning of the year indicate that at least some portion of Israelis who voted for one of the parties in this coalition believe it has gone too far, certainly farther than they intended. As the condescending cliché goes, elections have consequences.
So, supporters of Israel have looked with longing to the opposition, and it is this opposition we need to understand. Because much of this opposition—which, as a group, boycotted the last vote on the reasonableness bill so that it passed 64-0—is not so very different from the majority coalition. Even some of those that are genuinely concerned about the current government’s actions, as opposed to merely hating the Prime Minister, still fall far short of advocating for true democracy.
Consider the makeup of the opposition. It is led by Yair Lapid and his Yesh Atid party. That’s the same Lapid who not so long ago kicked off his campaign for prime minister in the settlement of Ariel, backed settlement expansion, and vowed that Jerusalem will never be shared with the Palestinians.
The National Unity party has been polling as the favorite if the current government were to fall. It is led by Benny Gantz, who has repeatedly bragged about how many “Arabs” he has killed, prided himself on sending Gaza “back to the stone age,” and supported annexation of most of the West Bank under Donald Trump’s plan.
Gantz’s National Unity partner, Gideon Sa’ar, is a former member of Likud, who was once seen as Benjamin Netanyahu’s main rival in the party, and generally attacked Netanyahu from the right. He was a vocal proponent of annexing the West Bank and opposed to any independent Palestinian autonomy, let alone a state.
And then there’s Avigdor Liberman, and his Yisrael Beiteinu party. Liberman was once a rising star on the Israeli right, but, like his fellow right winger, Naftali Bennett, broke with Netanyahu, over both political and personal issues. Liberman has advocated expelling Palestinian citizens of Israel, even cutting whole Arab towns and cities out of his vision of a purely Jewish state. That’s his version of a two-state solution. He has repeatedly called for boycotts against businesses owned by Palestinian citizens of Israel. And he did it without any sense of irony.
Between them, Lapid, Gantz, Sa’ar, and Lieberman control 42 of the 56 seats in the Knesset’s opposition. Opposing the current government’s assault on the democracy Israel reserves for Jews must, if there is any consideration of justice and ethics, demand a democracy that includes all the people under the blanket of the Israeli government, Jews and non-Jews alike. Every one of these “opposition leaders” stands against that idea.
Of the mere 14 seats that remain, four are controlled by the remnants of the Labor party. Labor is the party that built Israel into the ethnocracy it is. While widely seen as a left wing party, Labor pioneered the settlement of the territories captured in 1967. Before that, it enacted one draconian law after another aimed at dispossessing Palestinians within their new state and keeping them under martial law for twenty years. This history shows Labor to be a deeply racist party.
It is, in any case, a dying party, with each successive leader over the past quarter century being more incompetent than the last, with its most recent one, Meirav Michaeli probably having dealt the party its death blow by refusing to ally with its long-time partner, Meretz, in the last election, causing the Netanyahu-led majority to gain an extra seat or two while leaving Meretz outside of the current Knesset.
Meretz, for its part, has long been by far the most progressive of the Zionist parties, but has consistently shied away from taking the bold steps necessary to fight for true democracy in Israel. Specifically, it has been unwilling to ally with Palestinian parties, such as the Joint List, which could have meant a powerful, albeit challenging stance promoting Jewish-Arab unity and equality. But this was too much for Meretz, and still appears to be, so there is little hope there, even though most polls indicate it has a decent chance of getting back into the Knesset. Labor does not.
The remaining ten seats are split between the conservative United Arab List, commonly known as Ra’am, which gained some notoriety by becoming the first Arab party in Israel to be a full member of a governing coalition last year, and the Hadash-Ta’al coalition which is a combination of left-wing and moderate Arab nationalist parties. Hadash and Ta’al, as well as the Balad party, which broke from the other two and failed to get enough votes to get into the Knesset, are all too nationalistic to ever be considered as partners by Jewish parties, and even Ra’am, faced enormous racism and had only limited influence in the last government.
The recent elections in Israel have been characterized, correctly, as a referendum on Netanyahu and his corrupt rule. This is the question that divides the Israeli electorate, not democracy. Most of the people protesting in Israel don’t want real democracy, because that would, by definition, include Palestinians.
In any case, there is a reason this government is in power: the Israeli population overwhelmingly voted for the right wing. Some like to point out that Netanyahu’s coalition didn’t get many more votes than the opposition. But, as I’ve explained here, the opposition is overwhelmingly dominated by the Israeli right. Right of center or right wing parties hold a massive 106 out of the 120 seats in the Knesset. This right wing character of Israel goes far deeper than the mere 64-seat majority Netanyahu has.
Liberal Jews, in Israel, the US, or elsewhere, as well as liberal non-Jews need to recognize what Israel is: a country dominated by the right wing. While Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben Gvir may be extreme figures, they represent views which, if perhaps not squarely in the Israeli mainstream, aren’t far from it. It’s not the Tel Aviv mainstream, but there’s a lot more to Israel than Tel Aviv.
The Israeli opposition is united on one point: most of them loathe Benjamin Netanyahu too much to work with him. But they hold no great love for democracy or universal principles of human rights.
In the United States, the UK, Germany, Canada, Australia, and the other great centers of support for Israel there needs to be an awakening to what Israel is. This is not some bizarre 21st century mutation of a country. It is the inevitable outcome of an ethnocentric, highly nationalistic, supremely militaristic state that, though still largely secular, has seen religious fervor grow in influence over the course of the past five decades.
Israel in 2023 is the endpoint of a natural evolution of a state that pretends toward democracy, but reserves that democracy for one specific ethnic group in a country with millions of people who are not members of that ethnic group. Israel was always going to get here. Netanyahu’s brazen corruption just got it there a little faster.
Some recent pieces of mine that you might find interesting.
I wrote about the dwindling prospects of expanding or even maintaining the Abraham Accords. While Morocco has embraced Israel this is a minor victory as that kingdom has long stood out for its relationship with Israel, even when it claimed not to have one. But I explain here why Saudi Arabia is not entering this deal any time soon despite the Biden administration’s fervor for it, which is considerably greater than Israel’s.
The Abraham Accords are starting to fall apart
https://mondoweiss.net/2023/06/the-abraham-accords-are-starting-to-fall-apart/
For the Fourth of July this year, I was inspired to write a bit about the absurdity of venerating the “founding fathers,” a group of white men, mostly slave owners, all misogynists and elitists. We shouldn’t be taking the views of these men seriously at all, let alone treat them as some sort of gospel that must determine our decisions in the 21st century.
Thoughts for the Fourth of July
https://rethinkingforeignpolicy.org/2023/07/04/thought-for-the-fourth-of-july/
In the aftermath of Israel’s massive assault on the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank, we heard the usual droning about “Israel’s right to defend itself.” But what does international law actually say about that right? You might be surprised by the answer. I wrote about it for Mondoweiss.
Israel does not have a right to self-defense for its occupation
https://mondoweiss.net/2023/07/israel-does-not-have-a-right-to-self-defense-for-its-occupation/
I responded to Thomas Friedman’s claim that the United States was undertaking a “reassessment” of its relationship with Israel. Would that it was but the Biden administration and Congress showed that was not the case, as I explained.
As the US-Israel relationship is questioned, its ‘shared fictions’ remain strong
https://mondoweiss.net/2023/07/as-the-us-israel-relationship-is-questioned-its-shared-fictions-remain-strong/
Isaac Herzog’s speech to a joint session was blander than clear broth, but it really didn’t matter. Its purpose was to reassure Congress and liberal Zionists across the United States and thus shore up the US-Israel relationship that was being so badly sundered by Netanyahu. I examined how successful it was.
Herzog’s bland speech shows Israel still has great power in DC
https://mondoweiss.net/2023/07/herzogs-bland-speech-shows-israel-still-has-great-power-in-dc/
Finally, just before the Knesset passed the first bill of the “judicial reform” I reacted to Nicholas Kristof’s article from last weekend where he, with the support of two former ambassadors to Israel and two other icons of the liberal Zionist leadership in Washington, called for the end of US military aid to Israel. It was a remarkable development, and I looked at its meaning and how I believe advocates for Palestinian rights should respond.
Leading liberal Zionist voices call for ending U.S. aid to Israel
https://mondoweiss.net/2023/07/leading-liberal-zionist-voices-call-for-ending-u-s-aid-to-israel/