Now we learn thanks to the intelligence leaks reported on by the New York Times and others that the Mossad played an active role in encouraging the judicial demonstrations in Israel. Of course, everyone’s denying it which is all the evidence we really need that it’s true.
The Mossad was out to get Netanyahu in much the same way that the CIA was out to get Trump. Invariably, intelligence services become loyal only to their own sense of self-importance.
For those wondering how a leak of this magnitude could have happened, it’s a bit of a misnomer to refer to these spies as members of an intelligence service. Calling them keystone Kops would be more accurate.
In the United States perhaps the recent embarrassing leaks might have been prevented if the CIA had redirected some of its efforts from coming up with laughable excuses to suggest that the United States didn’t order the destruction of NordStream to a greater focus on counterintelligence.
This is so great. It has taken me a couple days to get to it. But i have spent my morning today reading. This is invaluable because there is virtually no in depth discussion anywhere of what the reforms mean and where they come from. I knew from the outset when I first heard that Israel was seeking to give the government total power to override judicial decisions and make judicial appointments--that this was terrible! Because I am already aware of how vital independent judiciary is to any functional liberal democracy. So reading these headlines, I already knew why what’s happening in Israel is so alarming, but so far I’ve totally lacked knowledge of the new government’s potential for authoritarianism in the context of Israeli history. Thanks so much
Glad it was helpful. It helps me a lot when readers ask questions like these because it tells me what they actually *want* to know about--sometimes it's not obvious to me that something like this needs an explainer.
It would be particularly interesting to get Adam Garfinkle’s take on the judicial controversy in Israel. He knows more than most about internecine Jewish conflict which has been a constant feature of Jewish history from ancient times.
The current judicial conflict is reminiscent of the struggle between the Hellenistic Jews and the more devout Jews that led to the Hanukkah story.
While the Sunday School version of the story suggests the conflict was between the Maccabees and their Greek-oriented overlords, Garfinkle has relayed the historically accurate version. According to Garfinkle, the ancient conflict was between Jews who thought that what was beautiful was holy, and those who thought that what was holy was beautiful. Fast forward more than two thousand and the Israeli demonstrators play the part of the Hellenized Jews while their opponents play the part of the Maccabees and their partisans.
This is from Garfinkle,
“In the Hellenistic culture of the day, along with its aesthetic and philosophic/proto-scientific accomplishments, its wealth, and its power, there was at least de facto social sanction for infanticide and patricide, slavery (as opposed to indentured servitude, which is actually what is discussed in the Torah), male homosexuality up to and including pederasty, concubinage outside of marriage, and, least of all I suppose, public sports nudity, among other things. Call them stuffy and old-fashioned, but Jewish traditionalists could not abide such behaviors, all of them prohibited by Jewish law and custom.”
No one suggests that the demonstrators in today’s Israel support infanticide, patricide or slavery, but they are far more likely than their more traditional political opponents to eschew Jewish law as it has been understood for centuries.
Garfinkle’s rendition of the Hanukkah story is both riveting and brilliant. On the eve of another and far more important Jewish holiday (Passover) It is well worth a read. See,
“Trump, Orbán, Erdoğan, Bolsinaro, Kaczyński, Modi, and now Netanyahu—the movements these figures lead have a great deal in common.” (Claire Berkinski)
What they have in common is enormous popularity unlike Macron, Sunak, Biden or the other national leaders more to Claire’s liking. Trump and Bolsinaro lost by the skin of their teeth while the other populist leaders Claire despises cruise from one electoral landslide to the next.
Just in the past few months, populist parties have enjoyed enormous success all over Europe. First there was the Italian election that deposed a globalist icon. Then there was the unprecedented success of a populist, supposedly neo-fascist party in Sweden (of all places). Just in the past couple of weeks the Finns Party in Finland and the brand new Farmers Party in Holland had huge electoral successes and are on their way to marginalizing the mainstream governing coalitions that Claire is partial to.
The more interesting question is how to explain the increasing revulsion to globalism and liberalism that is becoming increasingly apparent almost everywhere.
Obviously local concerns are always paramount. In Italy maybe it was immigration. In Sweden maybe it’s the bombs planted by Islamic militants that blow-up with alarming regularity. In Holland it was the Governments inexplicable decision to destroy the nation’s economy in the search for a nitrogen-free future.
Still, there are common themes underlying the increasing affinity for populism.
The Neoliberal projects in Iraq and Afghanistan cost $7 trillion. What did the West get for its money? The Taliban was replaced by the Taliban and we handed Iraq to Iran on a sliver platter. Sadly, these wars made a laughingstock of U.S. military power and moral authority.
Even in the unlikely event that Ukraine reclaims every square inch of its territory, the United States and the West end up as the biggest losers of the current war. We’ve midwifed an increasingly intimate relationship between our two biggest nuclear adversaries, China and Russia. We’ve pushed Saudi Arabia into the arms of the Chinese and India has made it clear that it won’t saddle its economy by pledging fealty to Ukraine. Most importantly, we’re clearly on the precipice of losing the dollar’s role as the sole world currency. At the beginning of the Ukraine War, Claire claimed the war would reinforce the role of the dollar. It’s now obvious she was wrong.
Liberalism is failing to deliver the goods; that’s why it’s being rejected. The reason is obvious; our ruling elite is grossly incompetent and their stupidity is giving liberalism a bad name almost everywhere.
As far as Israel is concerned, the people marching in the street are the foot soldiers of the ruling elite. They can’t win elections but they are still quite capable of screaming bloody murder like the intellectual infants that they are.
“Trump, Orbán, Erdoğan, Bolsinaro, Kaczyński, Modi, and now Netanyahu—the movements these figures lead have a great deal in common.” (Claire Berkinski)
What they have in common is enormous popularity unlike Macron, Sunak, Biden ...
Really? If Trump is more popular than Biden, how'd he manage to lose an election to him? And Bolsinaro?
I dare say Erdoğan is not "enormously popular" these days. He may even lose the election, which would be quite a feat in a country where the opposition is languishing in jail, every court and ministry is under his power, and the media belong to him. The latest polls show Kaczynski would lose if the election were held today.
Macron and Sunak are both polling poorly. But Anthony Albanese is doing great. Much better than Trump, Orbán, Erdoğan, Bolsinaro, Kaczyński, or Netanyahu—and the great thing about a normal liberal democrat like Albanese is that if voters do get sick of him, they can just vote him out.
I understand that you’re a fan of liberalism, Claire. In theory, liberalism has a lot to recommend it. In practice, it’s failing. In fact, no one; not Orban, not Modi, not Netanyahu not Trump are as illiberal as liberal elites. Don’t believe it? See,
Apr 5, 2023·edited Apr 5, 2023Liked by Claire Berlinski
As far as I can see, the problem boils down to one salient fact: Israel has no constitution. This, if not a fatal flaw, is a serious impediment to the maintenance of democratic accountability under the rule of law.
In the United States, the status of the federal judiciary is clear: It possesses all the powers necessary to discharge its lawful functions but is subject to a measure of democratic accountability. Judges are nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate. They have life tenure but are subject to impeachment and removal from office by Congress. One may argue that the US system is not perfect, but it's a model of legitimacy and probity by comparison with the mess in Israel.
Because Israel has no constitution, its Supreme Court has no claim legitimized by settled law on the powers it wields. On the other hand, the Israeli government, embodied in the Knesset, has no checks on its powers. In a parliamentary system with no formal constitution, the voice of the legislature is the literal voice of law. In principle, the Knesset can dispose of the Supreme Court as it pleases. Only force-politics, the threat of civil disorder and violence, has constrained it from doing so.
Demographic changes have exposed this serious if not fatal flaw at the heart of the Israeli political order. Netanyahu survives politically because there is no alternative (apologies, Claire) to him: He and he alone has proved capable of navigating through the rocks and shoals of Israeli politics. He has ridden the wave of those demographic changes, and those who wish him gone should ask themselves who would be likely to replace him on the surfboard. Personally, I doubt that it would be anybody to the political left of Bibi.
You're exactly right about the central problem, and indeed that's how we began this discussion, if you recall--Gaby's initial essay made this point.
As for there being no alternative to Bibi, I find that hard to believe: How could it be so? Why would only one man be capable of executing those responsibilities? If it's true, Israeli democracy has an even bigger problem than its lack of a constitution. (And indeed you'll find Israelis who will say just this: That only Bibi seems able to master this situation suggests a major flaw with Israeli democracy. But I can't see what the flaw is, exactly: I see his long tenure in power as attributable much more to contingent events and familiarity than to the inherent structure of the system.)
Apr 5, 2023·edited Apr 5, 2023Liked by Claire Berlinski
Here's what I think. Netanyahu's longstanding domination of Israeli politics has no single explanation. Contingent events have played a role, yes, but so have demographics and the systemic flaws of the Israeli political system. Let's think a bit about those latter two factors. Israel is evolving into a more conservative, more religious country, and the political system cannot adjust to the situation. Politics in Israel is first about coalition building, second about policy. You can't govern at all unless you're able to put together an ideologically cohesive coalition, i.e. one whose members agree on a sufficient number of issues to maintain the stability of the government. The last government fell because its sole organizing principle was detestation of Bibi. No wonder it floundered.
At some point, sure, an alternative to Netanyahu must emerge. Nobody lives forever, and he's in his seventies now. Once he's gone, there may be some possibility of crafting a center-right coalition that excludes the extremes, both Left and Right. Who might organize and lead it I couldn't say. But for now at least it looks to me as though there's no alternative to Bibi.
There's another aspect of the current crisis that I find disquieting: the mutiny of those Israeli air force reservists, who as a form of political protest refused to report for duty. This set a terrible precedent. Discipline is the nail, the screw, the bolt, the clamp, the glue that holds an army together. When discipline falters or fails, there's no longer an army, just an armed mob. In a democratic state, the cardinal virtue of the soldier is obedience to the lawful orders of superior officers.
That a thing like this has been allowed to happen leads me to think that the situation in Israel is dire indeed. Factionalism in the armed forces is a major threat to the security of the Jewish state.
Apr 5, 2023·edited Apr 5, 2023Liked by Claire Berlinski
Exactly right about the Air Force mutiny. That’s terrifying and shows the most dangerous fault line of all. There was nothing in the reforms that would have precluded an officer or airman from serving. They still have a duty to follow any legal (according to the Geneva Convention) orders. If civilian politics has infected the Israeli Air Force (and I wonder why this was limited to the Airedales, and didn’t seem to infect the rest of the IDF) to this point, and the Air Force is the key bulwark against Iran, that spells disaster for the Zionist experiment. We have had officers from Don Bolduc to Wesley Clark, and everywhere in between, but except for a rare Edwin Walker here and there, they all follow their orders. Not a propitious development, regardless of what you think of Bibi, Smotrich, and Ben Gvir or the reforms.
I agree that it's absolutely shocking. I should ask Gabi if he'd like to write a few words about this; it's very likely that I'm missing key insights into the culture of the Air Force that could help us to understand this.
And since when do soldiers fight for abstractions like "an independent judiciary?" Did they seriously propose to leave their wives and children undefended? Abandon them to Hezbollah's tender mercies? Allow their fellow airmen to go it alone? Something about this doesn't have the ring of truth. Israelis don't have anywhere else to go: They're stuck there and stuck with each other. Saying, "I don't want to defend a country that's not a democracy" is well and good, but that's their country, and if they don't defend it, it's pretty clear what their enemies have in store for them. It's a worse fate than living in a tinpot dictatorship, right?
In my not-inconsiderable experience, soldiers fight (or put up with various discomforts and unpleasantries) because they don't want to let down their comrades. A military unit is indeed a band of brothers—and sisters nowadays—and given good leadership, it will behave accordingly. Somewhere in the background, of course, there's consciousness of serving the nation and its people, consciousness of one's formal obligations under military law and regulations, etc.—but in a war zone such considerations recede into the background.
The IDF surely embodies all this military culture, with the additional consciousness of standing in Israel's defense against nearby, active threats to the very survival of the nation and its people. That's why I was so disagreeably struck by the gross insubordination of the air force pilots. If it were up to me, I'd have the lot of them court-martialed and cashiered.
Apr 5, 2023·edited Apr 5, 2023Liked by Claire Berlinski
I’d say so, since the only argument a tin pot dictator usually has is security. Or at least the pretense of security. That would be an interesting essay.
As to the question of why it was the air force reservists who mutinied, I suspect that a look that their social and educational background has a lot to do with it.
Well, the history of military mutinies is a checkered one. Two prominent examples are the Indian or Sepoy Mutiny (1857) and the French Army mutinies (1917). They both were spontaneous in origin, though the former matured into an organized rebellion. The latter was much less violent and more diffuse, and it was put down partly by force and partly by persuasion.
In many cases, such as the mutinies in the British Royal Navy during the Napoleonic wars, the main grievance was service conditions: poor food, inadequate pay, brutal discipline, and so on. The German naval mutiny at the end of the Great War was rather more political, being a component of the abortive 1918-19 German Revolution.
It seems to me probable that the Israeli air force mutiny was an organized effort, either within the ranks or at the instigation of outside figures. Given that the Israeli air force is a technologically sophisticated service whose personnel tend to be well educated and highly trained, I think it will be found that individuals from the secular, progressive segment of Israeli society are over-represented in its ranks. Since that segment of the population is the one most opposed to the new government, the conclusion to be drawn is obvious.
Apr 5, 2023·edited Apr 5, 2023Liked by Claire Berlinski
Thank you, Claire. That opened my eyes to a lot of your concerns. Sadly, it does seem that kicking the constitutional can down the road has pushed Israel to the verge of collapse. Is there any chance that Bennett, Gantz, Lapid, & Co can peel off enough more centrist Likud members and push a constitutional initiative? Or is Israel stuck with slim majority governments declaring illusory mandates (which happens just as much here in the States, c.f. McCarthy, Pelosi, Schumer, Trump, Obama, Biden et al, but we Americans have a pretty robust system of checks and balances, even if Congress has abdicated its primus inter pares role) without constitutional guardrails? And thank you for the deep dive on Ben Gvir’s Kahanism.
I asked Judith what she thought about your question. She said, "I'd say it's unlikely. We do seem to be stuck with recurrent slim-majority governments held together by unstable coalitions that declare illusory mandates. It's hard to picture Bennett, Gantz or Lapid leading us through the darkness to the uplands of a written constitution, but from our reader's mouth to God's ears."
It's odd how both the US and Israel are both so *evenly* polarized. Why should the ratio of Dems to Reps, pro-Bibi and anti-Bibi, be so close to 50-50? There's nothing natural about that ratio; it could just as easily be 60-40, right? An even division of opposed political forces in a society seems to be a recipe for acute polarization, I suppose because real power is constantly up for grabs.
Please thank Judith for me. The division between court and country parties is nothing new. Our winner take all primaries are driving our polarization here in the States, so I don’t know if more direct democracy is necessarily the answer. I know in the last few special elections in my area, the Democrats wisely planned their firehouse primaries on Sundays at African-American churches and community centers. That’s gotten them saner, more moderate candidates. But I’m sure the LGBTQ+ contingent will balk at that eventually, especially since a lesbian state delegate just got trounced in a state senate nomination contest.
How are MKs selected? Do they have constituencies like congressmen of MPs? Or are MKs allotted by percentage of the vote? I was just wondering, because more party control would ameliorate the situation here in the US, but if MKs don’t answer to anyone but their party leader, then that’s just as bad the other direction, especially considering the number of toxic personalities involved in this case.
They're elected from a single, nationwide electoral district and allocated using the D'Hondt method. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D'Hondt_method) There's a 3.24 election threshold. Parties select the candidates from a closed list--so voters vote for the party, not the candidate. It's basically the opposite problem from ours.
Mathematically it makes sense, but politically it just disconnects people from their representatives. Under this system, parliamentary representatives get elected based on the momentary passions of the national electorate, but they don’t have to answer to individual constituents, the people of particular areas don’t get representation for their needs, and I don’t see how you can allocate constituent services using this method. This might not matter for a small autonomous region like Åland or a small, ethnically homogeneous country like Iceland, but in a country as populous, diverse, and contentious as Israel it seems like it would only polarize the Knesset more than necessary. Who do the 30,000 citizens of Sderot turn to if they have a problem with a government check or an administrative agency decision? Even the UK has nominal constituencies, and MPs have to serve their constituents even if they have the most meager of connections to the seat. I guess what I’m saying is the D’Hondt method is a very Enlightenment answer that ignores a lot of Burkean functions of representative democracy. And from what I’m reading about Netanyahu, Gantz, Bennett, et al, it’s a dislocating system for a dislocated people.
This means a lot to me. In truth, it was a horrifying exercise. Probably like many Jews, I hate writing about these people or even thinking about them. It's as if they were made in a lab to confirm everything the world's anti-semites believe, and the antisemites of the world inevitably pounce on details like this and ascribe the beliefs of these revolting figures to Jews, full stop, and particularly Israelis. So I didn't feel as if I was doing the Jewish people any great favors with this catalogue.
Your question made me realize, though, how unhelpful it is to evade these facts in any discussion of this situation: They're not irrelevant to the assessment, but central.
I'm honestly glad this essay is finished; spending a weekend with the thoughts and works of Meir Kahane made me deeply uneasy--especially because I think the real story here is that Israelis have stood up to them in a way I've seen no other country do when confronted with a similar situation.
It’s understandable. The talking heads in the US seem to think that everyone more conservative than Lincoln Chaffee’s “far-right.” Which is why a lot of us balked as soon as we read “racist,” combined with the rest of Levy’s invective. I’m a center-right moderate NeverTrump Republican who votes Democratic more often than not these days, and my views are considered racist and far right by my fellow glittering urbanites with their “I Believe in Science” yard signs and “Pride” flags. Some of us have just been conditioned to ignore that type of vituperation over the last fifteen or so years. Once again, thank you for the dispassionate explication of Levy’s argument, Claire.
It is understandable, for exactly the reasons you say. And the confusion is my fault, editorially: I've known Judith for so long and so well that I suppose I just forgot that *you don't,* and you wouldn't know that Judith is ... well, let's just say, she is not a hysterical leftist. Nor a leftist at all. Nor *remotely* prone to hysteria about Israel. When I saw what she wrote, I thought, "Okay. If *Judith* is saying this, it's time to take this very seriously." But I know who Judith is.
There’s a crucial fact that Claire neglected to mention; Israel held five elections over a four year period. Despite the allegations against him, Netanyahu’s party, Likud, was the top vote recipient in every single one of those elections. Five times in a row, Netanyahu was the choice of Israeli citizens to be their Prime Minister.
In one of those elections, Netanyahu was able to form a coalition that briefly survived and in one of those elections Netanyahu’s opponents banded together to forge a short-lived coalition Government.
After each of his victories, despite the decks stacked against him by an elite-dominated judicial system, Netanyahu reached out to his political opponents in an attempt to forge a stable coalition. Only after he failed over and over again did he form a Government with the two right-wing henchman who he now depends on.
The fact that Ben-Gvir and Smotrich are in the Israeli Government is exclusively the fault of centrist and leftist political parties who refused Netanyahu’s pleas to join a coalition that he led. By extension, it’s the fault of those who voted for those parties, especially the Israelis currently engaged in the recent temper tantrums that we’ve witnessed.
All of the political parties who refused to sit with Netanyahu have stated that they would have happily entered a coalition with Likud as long as Likud selected a different leader.
It’s really quite simple; the political leaders of these parties hate Netanyahu so much that they would rather have Ben-Gvir and Smotrich in the Israeli Cabinet than sit in a Government led by a man that they personally despise, even if that man is the overwhelming choice of Israelis to serve as their Prime Minister.
Israelis who look at Ben-Gvir and Smotrich with disgust have no one but themselves to blame for the fact that these despicable men are Netanyahu’s side-kicks.
Had these Israelis put their country over their own petty prejudices, Ben-Gvir and Smotrich would still be mired in the swamp from which they emerged.
"The fact that Ben-Gvir and Smotrich are in the Israeli Government is exclusively the fault of centrist and leftist political parties who refused Netanyahu’s pleas to join a coalition."
Really. So Netanyahu is just sort of a stimulus-reflex machine, no free will at all? Well, if you say so.
The Israeli people decided in five elections in a row that they wanted Netanyahu as Prime Minister. On a policy basis, forming a coalition with the centrist political parties represented no problem at all. These parties demurred. The only way for Netanyahu to effectuate the will of the Israeli people was to align with the right wing nuts. Gantz, Lieberman and Lapid are the politicians responsible for empowering Ben-Gvir and Smotrich.
Now we learn thanks to the intelligence leaks reported on by the New York Times and others that the Mossad played an active role in encouraging the judicial demonstrations in Israel. Of course, everyone’s denying it which is all the evidence we really need that it’s true.
The Mossad was out to get Netanyahu in much the same way that the CIA was out to get Trump. Invariably, intelligence services become loyal only to their own sense of self-importance.
For those wondering how a leak of this magnitude could have happened, it’s a bit of a misnomer to refer to these spies as members of an intelligence service. Calling them keystone Kops would be more accurate.
In the United States perhaps the recent embarrassing leaks might have been prevented if the CIA had redirected some of its efforts from coming up with laughable excuses to suggest that the United States didn’t order the destruction of NordStream to a greater focus on counterintelligence.
This is so great. It has taken me a couple days to get to it. But i have spent my morning today reading. This is invaluable because there is virtually no in depth discussion anywhere of what the reforms mean and where they come from. I knew from the outset when I first heard that Israel was seeking to give the government total power to override judicial decisions and make judicial appointments--that this was terrible! Because I am already aware of how vital independent judiciary is to any functional liberal democracy. So reading these headlines, I already knew why what’s happening in Israel is so alarming, but so far I’ve totally lacked knowledge of the new government’s potential for authoritarianism in the context of Israeli history. Thanks so much
Glad it was helpful. It helps me a lot when readers ask questions like these because it tells me what they actually *want* to know about--sometimes it's not obvious to me that something like this needs an explainer.
I sent you an email a couple days ago inquiring about how we should continue our discussion of America’s China policy you proposed. Want to call me?
Nope, I want to write about it. But we could do a written dialogue, if you want to send me an email to kick it off. For publication.
So you want to do a piece on the merits of decoupling the US and Chinese economies, and you want to use our dialogue as a springboard for it?
It would be particularly interesting to get Adam Garfinkle’s take on the judicial controversy in Israel. He knows more than most about internecine Jewish conflict which has been a constant feature of Jewish history from ancient times.
The current judicial conflict is reminiscent of the struggle between the Hellenistic Jews and the more devout Jews that led to the Hanukkah story.
While the Sunday School version of the story suggests the conflict was between the Maccabees and their Greek-oriented overlords, Garfinkle has relayed the historically accurate version. According to Garfinkle, the ancient conflict was between Jews who thought that what was beautiful was holy, and those who thought that what was holy was beautiful. Fast forward more than two thousand and the Israeli demonstrators play the part of the Hellenized Jews while their opponents play the part of the Maccabees and their partisans.
This is from Garfinkle,
“In the Hellenistic culture of the day, along with its aesthetic and philosophic/proto-scientific accomplishments, its wealth, and its power, there was at least de facto social sanction for infanticide and patricide, slavery (as opposed to indentured servitude, which is actually what is discussed in the Torah), male homosexuality up to and including pederasty, concubinage outside of marriage, and, least of all I suppose, public sports nudity, among other things. Call them stuffy and old-fashioned, but Jewish traditionalists could not abide such behaviors, all of them prohibited by Jewish law and custom.”
No one suggests that the demonstrators in today’s Israel support infanticide, patricide or slavery, but they are far more likely than their more traditional political opponents to eschew Jewish law as it has been understood for centuries.
Garfinkle’s rendition of the Hanukkah story is both riveting and brilliant. On the eve of another and far more important Jewish holiday (Passover) It is well worth a read. See,
https://www.the-american-interest.com/2014/12/24/hanukology/
The similarity between the ancient conflict and the current conflict is uncanny.
Claire,
Thanks for all the work.
I have a much better understanding of this now.
I have always been suspicious of parliamentary systems being too close to mob rule.
Majorities, without checks, can endanger the individual, liberty, liberalism and freedom.
“Trump, Orbán, Erdoğan, Bolsinaro, Kaczyński, Modi, and now Netanyahu—the movements these figures lead have a great deal in common.” (Claire Berkinski)
What they have in common is enormous popularity unlike Macron, Sunak, Biden or the other national leaders more to Claire’s liking. Trump and Bolsinaro lost by the skin of their teeth while the other populist leaders Claire despises cruise from one electoral landslide to the next.
Just in the past few months, populist parties have enjoyed enormous success all over Europe. First there was the Italian election that deposed a globalist icon. Then there was the unprecedented success of a populist, supposedly neo-fascist party in Sweden (of all places). Just in the past couple of weeks the Finns Party in Finland and the brand new Farmers Party in Holland had huge electoral successes and are on their way to marginalizing the mainstream governing coalitions that Claire is partial to.
The more interesting question is how to explain the increasing revulsion to globalism and liberalism that is becoming increasingly apparent almost everywhere.
Obviously local concerns are always paramount. In Italy maybe it was immigration. In Sweden maybe it’s the bombs planted by Islamic militants that blow-up with alarming regularity. In Holland it was the Governments inexplicable decision to destroy the nation’s economy in the search for a nitrogen-free future.
Still, there are common themes underlying the increasing affinity for populism.
The Neoliberal projects in Iraq and Afghanistan cost $7 trillion. What did the West get for its money? The Taliban was replaced by the Taliban and we handed Iraq to Iran on a sliver platter. Sadly, these wars made a laughingstock of U.S. military power and moral authority.
Even in the unlikely event that Ukraine reclaims every square inch of its territory, the United States and the West end up as the biggest losers of the current war. We’ve midwifed an increasingly intimate relationship between our two biggest nuclear adversaries, China and Russia. We’ve pushed Saudi Arabia into the arms of the Chinese and India has made it clear that it won’t saddle its economy by pledging fealty to Ukraine. Most importantly, we’re clearly on the precipice of losing the dollar’s role as the sole world currency. At the beginning of the Ukraine War, Claire claimed the war would reinforce the role of the dollar. It’s now obvious she was wrong.
Liberalism is failing to deliver the goods; that’s why it’s being rejected. The reason is obvious; our ruling elite is grossly incompetent and their stupidity is giving liberalism a bad name almost everywhere.
As far as Israel is concerned, the people marching in the street are the foot soldiers of the ruling elite. They can’t win elections but they are still quite capable of screaming bloody murder like the intellectual infants that they are.
“Trump, Orbán, Erdoğan, Bolsinaro, Kaczyński, Modi, and now Netanyahu—the movements these figures lead have a great deal in common.” (Claire Berkinski)
What they have in common is enormous popularity unlike Macron, Sunak, Biden ...
Really? If Trump is more popular than Biden, how'd he manage to lose an election to him? And Bolsinaro?
I dare say Erdoğan is not "enormously popular" these days. He may even lose the election, which would be quite a feat in a country where the opposition is languishing in jail, every court and ministry is under his power, and the media belong to him. The latest polls show Kaczynski would lose if the election were held today.
Macron and Sunak are both polling poorly. But Anthony Albanese is doing great. Much better than Trump, Orbán, Erdoğan, Bolsinaro, Kaczyński, or Netanyahu—and the great thing about a normal liberal democrat like Albanese is that if voters do get sick of him, they can just vote him out.
It's a bit tougher to get rid of the others.
Sunak might be turning things around for the Tories, which I suspect is why Starmer expelled Corbyn.
I understand that you’re a fan of liberalism, Claire. In theory, liberalism has a lot to recommend it. In practice, it’s failing. In fact, no one; not Orban, not Modi, not Netanyahu not Trump are as illiberal as liberal elites. Don’t believe it? See,
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/guide-understanding-hoax-century-thirteen-ways-looking-disinformation
"Russo-phobia?" They're using the same playbook as the Muslim Brotherhood?
Claire, please don't waste your time on that article. The enemy knows that countering bullshit takes more time than spewing it.
"Liberalism is failing to deliver the goods; that’s why it’s being rejected."
That was unusually revealing.
As far as I can see, the problem boils down to one salient fact: Israel has no constitution. This, if not a fatal flaw, is a serious impediment to the maintenance of democratic accountability under the rule of law.
In the United States, the status of the federal judiciary is clear: It possesses all the powers necessary to discharge its lawful functions but is subject to a measure of democratic accountability. Judges are nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate. They have life tenure but are subject to impeachment and removal from office by Congress. One may argue that the US system is not perfect, but it's a model of legitimacy and probity by comparison with the mess in Israel.
Because Israel has no constitution, its Supreme Court has no claim legitimized by settled law on the powers it wields. On the other hand, the Israeli government, embodied in the Knesset, has no checks on its powers. In a parliamentary system with no formal constitution, the voice of the legislature is the literal voice of law. In principle, the Knesset can dispose of the Supreme Court as it pleases. Only force-politics, the threat of civil disorder and violence, has constrained it from doing so.
Demographic changes have exposed this serious if not fatal flaw at the heart of the Israeli political order. Netanyahu survives politically because there is no alternative (apologies, Claire) to him: He and he alone has proved capable of navigating through the rocks and shoals of Israeli politics. He has ridden the wave of those demographic changes, and those who wish him gone should ask themselves who would be likely to replace him on the surfboard. Personally, I doubt that it would be anybody to the political left of Bibi.
You're exactly right about the central problem, and indeed that's how we began this discussion, if you recall--Gaby's initial essay made this point.
As for there being no alternative to Bibi, I find that hard to believe: How could it be so? Why would only one man be capable of executing those responsibilities? If it's true, Israeli democracy has an even bigger problem than its lack of a constitution. (And indeed you'll find Israelis who will say just this: That only Bibi seems able to master this situation suggests a major flaw with Israeli democracy. But I can't see what the flaw is, exactly: I see his long tenure in power as attributable much more to contingent events and familiarity than to the inherent structure of the system.)
Here's what I think. Netanyahu's longstanding domination of Israeli politics has no single explanation. Contingent events have played a role, yes, but so have demographics and the systemic flaws of the Israeli political system. Let's think a bit about those latter two factors. Israel is evolving into a more conservative, more religious country, and the political system cannot adjust to the situation. Politics in Israel is first about coalition building, second about policy. You can't govern at all unless you're able to put together an ideologically cohesive coalition, i.e. one whose members agree on a sufficient number of issues to maintain the stability of the government. The last government fell because its sole organizing principle was detestation of Bibi. No wonder it floundered.
At some point, sure, an alternative to Netanyahu must emerge. Nobody lives forever, and he's in his seventies now. Once he's gone, there may be some possibility of crafting a center-right coalition that excludes the extremes, both Left and Right. Who might organize and lead it I couldn't say. But for now at least it looks to me as though there's no alternative to Bibi.
There's another aspect of the current crisis that I find disquieting: the mutiny of those Israeli air force reservists, who as a form of political protest refused to report for duty. This set a terrible precedent. Discipline is the nail, the screw, the bolt, the clamp, the glue that holds an army together. When discipline falters or fails, there's no longer an army, just an armed mob. In a democratic state, the cardinal virtue of the soldier is obedience to the lawful orders of superior officers.
That a thing like this has been allowed to happen leads me to think that the situation in Israel is dire indeed. Factionalism in the armed forces is a major threat to the security of the Jewish state.
Exactly right about the Air Force mutiny. That’s terrifying and shows the most dangerous fault line of all. There was nothing in the reforms that would have precluded an officer or airman from serving. They still have a duty to follow any legal (according to the Geneva Convention) orders. If civilian politics has infected the Israeli Air Force (and I wonder why this was limited to the Airedales, and didn’t seem to infect the rest of the IDF) to this point, and the Air Force is the key bulwark against Iran, that spells disaster for the Zionist experiment. We have had officers from Don Bolduc to Wesley Clark, and everywhere in between, but except for a rare Edwin Walker here and there, they all follow their orders. Not a propitious development, regardless of what you think of Bibi, Smotrich, and Ben Gvir or the reforms.
I agree that it's absolutely shocking. I should ask Gabi if he'd like to write a few words about this; it's very likely that I'm missing key insights into the culture of the Air Force that could help us to understand this.
And since when do soldiers fight for abstractions like "an independent judiciary?" Did they seriously propose to leave their wives and children undefended? Abandon them to Hezbollah's tender mercies? Allow their fellow airmen to go it alone? Something about this doesn't have the ring of truth. Israelis don't have anywhere else to go: They're stuck there and stuck with each other. Saying, "I don't want to defend a country that's not a democracy" is well and good, but that's their country, and if they don't defend it, it's pretty clear what their enemies have in store for them. It's a worse fate than living in a tinpot dictatorship, right?
In my not-inconsiderable experience, soldiers fight (or put up with various discomforts and unpleasantries) because they don't want to let down their comrades. A military unit is indeed a band of brothers—and sisters nowadays—and given good leadership, it will behave accordingly. Somewhere in the background, of course, there's consciousness of serving the nation and its people, consciousness of one's formal obligations under military law and regulations, etc.—but in a war zone such considerations recede into the background.
The IDF surely embodies all this military culture, with the additional consciousness of standing in Israel's defense against nearby, active threats to the very survival of the nation and its people. That's why I was so disagreeably struck by the gross insubordination of the air force pilots. If it were up to me, I'd have the lot of them court-martialed and cashiered.
Exactly.
I’d say so, since the only argument a tin pot dictator usually has is security. Or at least the pretense of security. That would be an interesting essay.
As to the question of why it was the air force reservists who mutinied, I suspect that a look that their social and educational background has a lot to do with it.
I don't want to sound conspiratorial, but surely something like this doesn't happen without encouragement from above--does it?
Well, the history of military mutinies is a checkered one. Two prominent examples are the Indian or Sepoy Mutiny (1857) and the French Army mutinies (1917). They both were spontaneous in origin, though the former matured into an organized rebellion. The latter was much less violent and more diffuse, and it was put down partly by force and partly by persuasion.
In many cases, such as the mutinies in the British Royal Navy during the Napoleonic wars, the main grievance was service conditions: poor food, inadequate pay, brutal discipline, and so on. The German naval mutiny at the end of the Great War was rather more political, being a component of the abortive 1918-19 German Revolution.
It seems to me probable that the Israeli air force mutiny was an organized effort, either within the ranks or at the instigation of outside figures. Given that the Israeli air force is a technologically sophisticated service whose personnel tend to be well educated and highly trained, I think it will be found that individuals from the secular, progressive segment of Israeli society are over-represented in its ranks. Since that segment of the population is the one most opposed to the new government, the conclusion to be drawn is obvious.
Thank you, Claire. That opened my eyes to a lot of your concerns. Sadly, it does seem that kicking the constitutional can down the road has pushed Israel to the verge of collapse. Is there any chance that Bennett, Gantz, Lapid, & Co can peel off enough more centrist Likud members and push a constitutional initiative? Or is Israel stuck with slim majority governments declaring illusory mandates (which happens just as much here in the States, c.f. McCarthy, Pelosi, Schumer, Trump, Obama, Biden et al, but we Americans have a pretty robust system of checks and balances, even if Congress has abdicated its primus inter pares role) without constitutional guardrails? And thank you for the deep dive on Ben Gvir’s Kahanism.
I asked Judith what she thought about your question. She said, "I'd say it's unlikely. We do seem to be stuck with recurrent slim-majority governments held together by unstable coalitions that declare illusory mandates. It's hard to picture Bennett, Gantz or Lapid leading us through the darkness to the uplands of a written constitution, but from our reader's mouth to God's ears."
It's odd how both the US and Israel are both so *evenly* polarized. Why should the ratio of Dems to Reps, pro-Bibi and anti-Bibi, be so close to 50-50? There's nothing natural about that ratio; it could just as easily be 60-40, right? An even division of opposed political forces in a society seems to be a recipe for acute polarization, I suppose because real power is constantly up for grabs.
Please thank Judith for me. The division between court and country parties is nothing new. Our winner take all primaries are driving our polarization here in the States, so I don’t know if more direct democracy is necessarily the answer. I know in the last few special elections in my area, the Democrats wisely planned their firehouse primaries on Sundays at African-American churches and community centers. That’s gotten them saner, more moderate candidates. But I’m sure the LGBTQ+ contingent will balk at that eventually, especially since a lesbian state delegate just got trounced in a state senate nomination contest.
How are MKs selected? Do they have constituencies like congressmen of MPs? Or are MKs allotted by percentage of the vote? I was just wondering, because more party control would ameliorate the situation here in the US, but if MKs don’t answer to anyone but their party leader, then that’s just as bad the other direction, especially considering the number of toxic personalities involved in this case.
They're elected from a single, nationwide electoral district and allocated using the D'Hondt method. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D'Hondt_method) There's a 3.24 election threshold. Parties select the candidates from a closed list--so voters vote for the party, not the candidate. It's basically the opposite problem from ours.
I appreciate the Declaration of Independence, but Lord, Jefferson had some silly ideas.
Why do you think it's silly? It seems reasonable to me. It's become almost the standard in parliaments.
Mathematically it makes sense, but politically it just disconnects people from their representatives. Under this system, parliamentary representatives get elected based on the momentary passions of the national electorate, but they don’t have to answer to individual constituents, the people of particular areas don’t get representation for their needs, and I don’t see how you can allocate constituent services using this method. This might not matter for a small autonomous region like Åland or a small, ethnically homogeneous country like Iceland, but in a country as populous, diverse, and contentious as Israel it seems like it would only polarize the Knesset more than necessary. Who do the 30,000 citizens of Sderot turn to if they have a problem with a government check or an administrative agency decision? Even the UK has nominal constituencies, and MPs have to serve their constituents even if they have the most meager of connections to the seat. I guess what I’m saying is the D’Hondt method is a very Enlightenment answer that ignores a lot of Burkean functions of representative democracy. And from what I’m reading about Netanyahu, Gantz, Bennett, et al, it’s a dislocating system for a dislocated people.
Claire - BRAVA! What a magnificent dissertation on Israeli judicial reform and a truly dispassionate dossier on Itamar Ben Gvir.
You convinced me - he IS a racist. And you convinced me that the reforms ARE illiberal (as well as anti-democratic, in their likely effects).
I cannot believe you found time to research and create such a comprehensive, thorough write-up. You can truly write faster than most people can read!
Thank you for taking the time - and tremendous effort - to respond to our criticisms and questions.
This means a lot to me. In truth, it was a horrifying exercise. Probably like many Jews, I hate writing about these people or even thinking about them. It's as if they were made in a lab to confirm everything the world's anti-semites believe, and the antisemites of the world inevitably pounce on details like this and ascribe the beliefs of these revolting figures to Jews, full stop, and particularly Israelis. So I didn't feel as if I was doing the Jewish people any great favors with this catalogue.
Your question made me realize, though, how unhelpful it is to evade these facts in any discussion of this situation: They're not irrelevant to the assessment, but central.
I'm honestly glad this essay is finished; spending a weekend with the thoughts and works of Meir Kahane made me deeply uneasy--especially because I think the real story here is that Israelis have stood up to them in a way I've seen no other country do when confronted with a similar situation.
Before your articles I hadn’t heard of Kahanists, just that Ben Gvir was “far-right.” This was, well, a bit further right than I had expected.
It’s understandable. The talking heads in the US seem to think that everyone more conservative than Lincoln Chaffee’s “far-right.” Which is why a lot of us balked as soon as we read “racist,” combined with the rest of Levy’s invective. I’m a center-right moderate NeverTrump Republican who votes Democratic more often than not these days, and my views are considered racist and far right by my fellow glittering urbanites with their “I Believe in Science” yard signs and “Pride” flags. Some of us have just been conditioned to ignore that type of vituperation over the last fifteen or so years. Once again, thank you for the dispassionate explication of Levy’s argument, Claire.
It is understandable, for exactly the reasons you say. And the confusion is my fault, editorially: I've known Judith for so long and so well that I suppose I just forgot that *you don't,* and you wouldn't know that Judith is ... well, let's just say, she is not a hysterical leftist. Nor a leftist at all. Nor *remotely* prone to hysteria about Israel. When I saw what she wrote, I thought, "Okay. If *Judith* is saying this, it's time to take this very seriously." But I know who Judith is.
Also: This is why we ought to reserve words like "racist" and "far-right" for when we really need them.
Exactly!
There’s a crucial fact that Claire neglected to mention; Israel held five elections over a four year period. Despite the allegations against him, Netanyahu’s party, Likud, was the top vote recipient in every single one of those elections. Five times in a row, Netanyahu was the choice of Israeli citizens to be their Prime Minister.
In one of those elections, Netanyahu was able to form a coalition that briefly survived and in one of those elections Netanyahu’s opponents banded together to forge a short-lived coalition Government.
After each of his victories, despite the decks stacked against him by an elite-dominated judicial system, Netanyahu reached out to his political opponents in an attempt to forge a stable coalition. Only after he failed over and over again did he form a Government with the two right-wing henchman who he now depends on.
The fact that Ben-Gvir and Smotrich are in the Israeli Government is exclusively the fault of centrist and leftist political parties who refused Netanyahu’s pleas to join a coalition that he led. By extension, it’s the fault of those who voted for those parties, especially the Israelis currently engaged in the recent temper tantrums that we’ve witnessed.
All of the political parties who refused to sit with Netanyahu have stated that they would have happily entered a coalition with Likud as long as Likud selected a different leader.
It’s really quite simple; the political leaders of these parties hate Netanyahu so much that they would rather have Ben-Gvir and Smotrich in the Israeli Cabinet than sit in a Government led by a man that they personally despise, even if that man is the overwhelming choice of Israelis to serve as their Prime Minister.
Israelis who look at Ben-Gvir and Smotrich with disgust have no one but themselves to blame for the fact that these despicable men are Netanyahu’s side-kicks.
Had these Israelis put their country over their own petty prejudices, Ben-Gvir and Smotrich would still be mired in the swamp from which they emerged.
"The fact that Ben-Gvir and Smotrich are in the Israeli Government is exclusively the fault of centrist and leftist political parties who refused Netanyahu’s pleas to join a coalition."
Really. So Netanyahu is just sort of a stimulus-reflex machine, no free will at all? Well, if you say so.
We all want there to be a government in Israel, right? If the other parties cannot form a coalition, someone has to.
The Israeli people decided in five elections in a row that they wanted Netanyahu as Prime Minister. On a policy basis, forming a coalition with the centrist political parties represented no problem at all. These parties demurred. The only way for Netanyahu to effectuate the will of the Israeli people was to align with the right wing nuts. Gantz, Lieberman and Lapid are the politicians responsible for empowering Ben-Gvir and Smotrich.