To My Friends in the Diaspora - Your Lifeboat is at Risk - Support the Campaign to Stop Netanyahu's Constitutional Putsch

 s://www.timesofisrael.com/largest-protests-yet.../

A word to my friends in the Diaspora.

The mass campaign to stop Netanyahu and his Hardal+Haredi bloc from undermining the constitutional rules of the political game in Israel needs your support.

This is not a left/right issue. This should not be an orthodox versus non-orthodox matter.

Netanyahu and his Hardal+Haredi block of extremists are not trying to “reform” the judicial system. I do not oppose judicial reform.

On trial for corruption, Netanyahu and his bloc aim to monopolize how judges are appointed, to politicize public broadcasting, the national bureau of statistics, and the national library. To transform Israel into a theocracy.

To allow felons to serve as cabinet ministers. They want to gut judicial review.

The protest campaign aims to save Israel from becoming a “democracy” based on pure majority rules, like Iran, Turkey, or Hungary. The campaign aims to preserve democratic values, which MUST rise above pure majority rules. Values like minority rights, checks & balances, separation of powers, and civil liberties. These should not depend on popular whim or votes in a Knesset where Netanyahu and his radical Hardal+Haredi allies have a 3-4 seat majority.

Pure majority rule happens in the UN General Assembly, where an automatic majority can condemn Israel at will.

This is a campaign that brings together a broad-based ad hoc coalition of political frenemies - refugees from the Jabotinsky camp of liberal nationalism and security hawks (like myself) alongside New Israel Fund/Meretz types and even wacko "anarchists."

The Third Commonwealth is at risk, so a united front is in order. If you can keep your head when everybody around you is losing theirs, then it is very probable that you don’t understand the seriousness of the situation.

If you appreciate what "democracy" really is, then you can appreciate that Israel is facing an unprecedented struggle.

Your lifeboat is at risk. Do not be lulled.

NETANYAHU IS TO BLAME

What Netanyahu's Likud, along with its Hardal and Haredi collaborators, are doing is equivalent to committing Oslo to the domestic body politic.

By a three-vote majority, Netanyahu has just won the first Knesset round that would give him the power to select judges (recall he’s on trial and may need to appeal before the judges he picks) and effectively end judicial review by the High Court.

We are heading to pure majority rule predicated on a margin of 3-4 Bibi-loyalist Likudnikim and politico-Haredi extremists, thereby embarking on the road to illiberal democracy - the last stop- perhaps being a theocracy.

They want to end the Supreme Court's power of judicial review as it relates to fundamental values.

They want to defund public broadcasting and will be bolstering their own pro-government channel 14.

They want to pass coercive religious promulgations.

They want to allow convicted criminals to serve in the cabinet.

They have normalized thuggery and racism in the Knesset.

They want to push the Palestinian Arabs to the wall to ignite a religious war.

And they want to fundamentally alter the rules of the game and the ethos of the state on the basis of a slim Knesset majority.

NB For a reasoned critique of Netanyahu's regime change efforts, read David Horovitz here:

Several friends have asked for a source in English for news in Israel. My recommendation is The Times of Israel.

Democratic Values & Civil Liberties are at Risk in Israel as Netanyahu and allies pursue Regime Change

Israel only finds itself at this junction because of the (criminal) Trials of Netanyahu.

Each day reveals new aspects of his vindictive plans for regime change.

Times like these make for strange political bedfellows. The stakes are so high. The ethos of Herzlian Zionism is at risk. What matters is blocking constitutional transformations that would rob Israelis of civil liberties and the values that give the word "democracy" meaning.

<>Netanyahu’s demagogic minister of information has declared that Kol Yisroel / Kan public broadcasting is “racist.” She and Netanyahu want to close publicly supported media outlets.

<>His multiple ministers of religion want gender segregation in our national parks.

<>Without fanfare in Jerusalem, public libraries are already segregated.

<> One of his supporters wants to authorize physicians not to treat Arabs.

<> He has robbed the Minister of Defense of key powers to operate in the West Bank, handing them instead to the leader of the Hardal Religious Zionist Party.

<>He has promised the King of Jordan that there will be no changes in the status quo on the Temple Mount. Yet everyone can see the changes - thousands more visitors, prayers, genuflecting. And his Minister of Internal security is hinting at animal sacrifices for the Passover holiday.

<>Museums open for free to the public on Shabbat are to be closed or forced to charge admission (robbing observant people of the chance to visit)

<>Talmud study will be considered a core educational value and financially rewarded, while English and math will not be required in Haredi schools.

<> A Who’s Who of Israeli economists, Nobel Prize winners among them, and central bankers, many recruited and appointed by Netanyahu, are warning that his plans for regime change will undermine foreign investment in our economy. He dismisses them as leftists and fear-mongers.

<> Law school deans, venture capitalists, medical school deans, and the leaders of our hi-tech community have all come up against regime change.

<> One of his MKs, a former editor who quit 'Israel Today' when it stopped blindly backing Netanyahu, plans to introduce legislation to make it illegal for a secret recording to be used in press exposes. This (according to a secret recording of him!) is just the start of efforts to curb press freedom.

<>Another minister wants to end the generation of electricity on Shabbat.

<> Yet another wants to end all infrastructure work on Shabbat (keeping in mind that Sunday is a regular work day and many children have school on Friday). Much of this work is anyway done by non-Jews.

Lots of folks are piggybacking on the anti-regime change protests. Channel 14 (which is loyal to Netanyahu) reported that the New Israel Fund is financing protests against Netanyahu. I have no reason to doubt this.

But like Donald Trump and Netanyahu himself, not everything the NIF does is wrongheaded. In this instance -- whatever its ulterior motives -- the ends justify the means. After all, Israel is facing its greatest constitutional crisis since 1948.

Most rallies have been organized as cross-party Big Tent protests against regime change based on a single Knesset election (resulting in a 64-56 Knesset). The judicial system needs reform, but it has to come as part of a coherent constitutional plan for Israel, not as a “get-out-of-jail” card for demagogues.

I oppose radical alterations in the judiciary that set the stage for democracy based on pure majority rule. Do we want Israel to be like the UN General Assembly and suffer from the tyranny of the majority?

Those trying to hijack our protest movement to fly enemy flags or carry unrelated banners are playing into the hands of the Netanyahu-Haredi-Hardal camp’s claim that the opposition is comprised of radical, the Godless, and leftists. The negative elements exploiting our protest have their own agenda, and there is no reasoning with them any more than with the Bibists/Hardalnikim and Haredim in control of the government.

Now is the time for liberal Jabotinsky nationalists, centrists, Zionist left-wingers, and indeed Israeli citizens of all stripes and hues to focus on one goal: blocking regime change that will turn this country into a Hardal/Haredi theocracy with limited civil liberties.

For more information, go to 

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1512241989262016

To book me to speak to your group or for a briefing on your next visit to Israel email me ej5@nyu.edu

THIS IS US A demographic Look at Israel 2023

Join us this Monday, January 9, at 10:30 AM

Rehovot 

Community Center

Haim Sireni 52 

For a Talk by

ELLIOT JAGER

THIS IS US

A demographic Look at Israel

Who are we? Where do you fit in?

 

The headlines tell us Israel is divided and at a crossroads.

“Ben Gvir faces a dilemma as activists ask to hold Passover sacrifice on Temple Mount”

“Jewish extremists appear to vandalize Christian graves in Old City”

“Israel’s Justice Minister Levin presents dramatic court reforms”

“New government fails to invite AG to the first cabinet meeting, amid threats to fire her”

“‘Override Clause’ Would allow Knesset to pass laws that contradict the country’s 12 Basic Laws and Eliminate the Supreme Court’s ability to Nullify them”

 

Elliot Jager will paint a timely demographic portrait

of Israeli society in 2023

 

Elliot is an NYU-trained political scientist, author, and book editor. He was the editorial page editor at the Jerusalem Post, Jewish world editor at The Jerusalem Report, founding managing editor of Jewish Ideas Daily (Mosaic) and a writer for Newsmax. He is currently working on a primer aimed at Millennials and Zoomers about Jewish Civilization.

 

 

 

November 2022 Israeli Elections – Dispiriting for Moderates (updated with final numbers)

Do not Look for a Silver Lining.

The November 1 Israeli Knesset election results are dispiriting for moderates and centrists. It is a lonely time for non-ideologues, those not swept up by the Netanyahu cult of personality, and those not stridently religious.

Netanyahu’s Likud pulled 23.41% of the ballot (1,115,336) popular votes). The Hardal alignment led by Smotrich and Ben-Gvir drew 10.84% of the poll (516,470 popular votes). The Sephardi Haredim of Shas garnered 8.25% (392,964 popular ballots), and the Ashkenazi UTJ Haredim won 5.88% (280,194 popular votes).

That means 2,304,964 Israelis voted for the Netanyahu + Hardel + Haredi bloc giving it control of the Knesset with 64 seats (out of 120).

Elements of the bloc are committed to undermining representative democracy, gutting the judiciary, and imposing theocratic rule. This dreadful scenario won’t happen anytime soon because of in-fighting within this axis of intolerance and demagoguery. However, the November 1 victory is a roadmap to where Israel could be heading if the Hardal–Haredi alliance holds. 

They are now as powerful as Likud, which will likely wane when Netanyahu falters.

***

By comparison, the centrist or moderate vote, divided between Lapid with 17.79% (847,435) popular votes) and Gantz, with 9.08% (432,482 popular votes), totaled 1,279,917 or 36 seats out of 120 Knesset seats.

So 1,279,917 moderate voters as against  2,304,964 ballots for the parties of God/Netanyahu.

Also on the anti-Netanyahu side is the ethnic Russian-speaking vote (secular and hawkish but demographically diminishing) of Lieberman, who got 4.48% (213,687 of the popular vote). Merav Michaeli’s hodgepodge Labor drew 3.69% (or 175,992 popular votes). This brings the total number of votes against the Netanyahu axis to 1,669,596.

If you also throw in the Arab Islamist pragmatist who got 4.07% (194,047 popular votes), the total is 1,863,643 popular votes against Netanyahu. 

Only if you stretch to include the stridently anti-Zionist Arab Communist/Nationalist ticket, which drew 3.75% (178,735 popular votes), do you finally pull 2,042,378

Of the voters who supported parties that crossed the threshold, slightly LESS opposed Netanyahu than favored him.

Keep in mind that the anti-Netanyahu camp runs at cross purposes. It has no leader around whom to rally. It is politically, ethnically, and religiously disjointed and poses no threat to the Netanyahu axis. 

The best hope for the anti-Netanyahu camp is to pray his axis devours itself in intramural backbiting.

I see little that gives succor to Israel’s moderate and centrist minority.

I expand on this analysis in my private briefings and lectures – so be in touch to arrange one. Ej5@nyu.edu