Apparently, in the last election campaign, the left collapsed, while the center, the right, and the extreme right grew stronger. illusion. It’s simply not internalizing the changes that Israel is going through and an attempt by politicians to cling to past concepts, beliefs and views that actually led them to the current crisis.
Apparently, in the last election campaign, the left collapsed, while the center, the right, and the extreme right grew stronger. illusion. It’s simply a failure to internalize the changes that Israel is going through and an attempt by politicians to cling to concepts of the past
In the 2022 elections, the center actually crashed. The same imaginary world of parties that squint to the right and talk to the left. The same parties that have already tried 5 times to win over right-wing voters, disguise themselves as right-wing and claim that they are not left but center and center-right.
But actually they escape the definition required these days. It is no longer about the division of the 70s or 90s between left and right. The Israel of 1.11.22 is divided between parties that still support democracy, the rule of law, liberalism and human and civil rights, and anti-democratic parties that despise the law and pull Israel in a messianic religious direction that is exploitative, unequal and without respect for human and civil rights.
The squinting towards the extreme right and the anti-democratic right caused the change government to give up laws that would limit the return of the person accused of bribery to the prime ministership, to give up on lowering the percentage of obstruction, to give up the two-term law and to give up a determined fight against the severe incitement led by the Netanyahu-led Likud against the change government. A squint that did not bring a single vote from the Netanyahu supporters camp to the change camp.
A squint that focused the fight on all of Netanyahu’s failures, his lies, his criminal files and the investigative committees on the submarine and Miron affairs. Everything was silenced for the sake of flattering the Likud voters, who might, just might, one of them would be willing to move towards the parties of change.
The squint to the extreme right has centered the fight against Netanyahu’s failures, his lies, his criminal files and the investigative committees on the submarine and Miron affairs. Everything was silenced for the sake of flattering the Likud voters, so that maybe one of them would be willing to move
But the Likud has long since ceased to be a “center” right-wing party. The Likud has moved to the extreme end of the scale, and in its quest for power is allied with the Kohenists and the Messianic, the most extreme ultra-Orthodox and the racist nationalists. There is no center there.
But now we have to recognize the reality that has been created. It is no longer just about a fight against a prime minister accused of crimes.
Yair Lapid can continue to hide behind the centrist sign that he loves so much, but he currently represents positions of the democratic, secular, liberal and even social left. Benny Gantz, Gideon Sa’ar, Gadi Eisenkot and Matan Kahane can brand themselves with slogans of the moderate right, supporters of a complete Land of Israel and a sane and moderate Jewish identity, conflict reducers, against a binational state and other verbal stunts of the apparent center right, but in fact today they represent leftist positions A sane secular democrat who observes law and statehood.
Because those who currently support the continuation of the occupation of the territories, are actually supporting the riots of the youth of the hills, the wholesale violations of the law by violent settlers, the flow of funds to illegal settlements, the destruction of the High Court of Justice and opposition to the rules of international law that consider the occupation a violation of the law.
Sa’ar, Gantz and Eisenkot cannot identify with the extreme right positions of Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben Gvir. They cannot support the changes that are currently being proposed in the coalition negotiations, including neutering the High Court of Justice, turning the ombudsmen in government offices into positions of trust, abolishing the crime of breach of trust and making gender segregation in public places a normative legal act. This is simply not a division that allows them to be defined as center-right.
But the Likud has long since ceased to be a “center” right-wing party. The Likud worked to the extremes of the scale, and in its quest for power allied with the Kohenists and the Messianic, the most extreme ultra-Orthodox and the racist nationalists. There is no center there
The reality that openly shows the extremism of the emerging coalition, requires a sharp division between two worldviews. It is no longer a classic left or right and the issue of the territories is at the center of it.
The issue of the Palestinian problem will be resolved when those who squint to the right will understand and act openly for what they really represent today. A democratic, egalitarian state that observes law and statehood, protects the rights of minorities, and is a member of the family of enlightened nations. From here will also come the change in relation to the occupation. There is no other choice.
On the other side of the Iron Curtain, a clerical coalition is trying to cut off Israel from the family of democracies, to crush the norms of the rule of law, to perpetuate rule over the state’s budgets by force of arms, with verbal and physical violence, to change the values of the treatment of people, women’s rights, LGBT people and Palestinians through predatory legislation and takeover on the democratic parliament.
This group cannot be defined as “right wing”. This is not the right wing of Menachem Begin who sanctified the judges in Jerusalem, signed autonomy and recognition of the legitimate rights of the Palestinians, signed a peace agreement with Egypt and withdrew from Sinai.
This is not the right wing of Eric Sharon that unilaterally withdrew from Gaza, and recognized the control of three million Palestinians as an occupation. It is not even the right wing of Benjamin Netanyahu, who signed the Hebron Agreement and the Wai Agreement and supported secession and signed the deal of the century, in which he agrees to the establishment of a Palestinian state.
The reality that openly shows the extremism of the emerging coalition, requires a sharp division between two worldviews. It is no longer a classic left or right and the issue of the territories is at the center of it
The Netanyahu of the 2022 elections goes beyond the Iron Curtain when he joins a borderless coalition, which plans to destroy democracy for a government without straits.
In this division there is no room for the center. There is actually no center. Is it possible to find a balanced compromise between the coalition’s demands to free the members of the Yeshiva from any obligation to recruit or pay taxes and to finance their lives forever at the hands of the taxpayers regardless of their numbers?
Is it possible to find a compromise with the demand to prevent public transportation on Shabbat from any citizen who does not have a private car? “Let them stay at home,” stated MK Yitzhak Goldknopf with uncompromising nobility.
Is it possible to find a “center” in the law of the clause to overcome High Court rulings? Is it possible to find a balance with those who claim that “human rights organizations are an existential threat to Israel”?
It is impossible to be a center between sanity and madness. Between respect for the law and those who destroy the law.
Between those who consciously lead to the transformation of Israel into a racist, dark, unequal state and those who see this as a national disaster.
There is no center between them.
There is no center between those who violently attacked the bridge protesters and their attackers.
Therefore, the parties that won the opposition in the 2022 elections must recognize the facts, the reality, and formulate their fight for the hearts of the voters from positions that identify the opponent and the reality he is trying to impose on Israel, and not from the positions of the past and the old division between right and left as we have known it for decades.
Is it possible to find a balance with those who claim that “human rights organizations are an existential threat to Israel”? It is impossible to be a center between sanity and madness. Between respect for the law and its destruction
It is impossible to have a cultural debate about democratic values with those who want to eliminate democracy. This struggle is a struggle for life or death, and as such it needs to be conducted with precise tools and requires sharp decisions against an unscrupulous and uninhibited political opponent.