BENDING THE TRUTH
Levin and Netanyahu
As you probably know I rely mainly
on open-source information for my weekly posts. A considerable amount of the
news I relay to you is derived from opinion pieces and TV panel programmes. Members
of the panel include analysts from various academic institutes, former advisers/strategists
in the prime minister’s bureau, and journalists specialising in political topics.
In addition, guest speakers are often
invited to take part in the discussions.
Although Anshel Pfeffer has participated
in TV panel discussions, he is first and foremost a journalist. Pfeffer is a
senior
correspondent
for Haaretz and
Israel correspondent for The
Economist.
He is
also the author of Bibi -The Turbulent Life and Times of Benjamin Netanyahu.
Watching
the evening TV newscasts in recent weeks I wondered how the demonstrations were
organised, namely who was behind the organisation of the massive regimented
columns of flag- carrying protesters.
Pfeffer answered many of these queries
in a column he published this week. “When the Netanyahu
government’s newly
appointed Justice Minister Yariv Levin, presented his strategy for ‘legal reform’ six days
after taking office, he looked unstoppable. The plan had been well-prepared,
even years in the making.
Its first tranche alone would, among other things, prevent
the Supreme Court from disqualifying laws it deemed unconstitutional, replace
the legal counsels of government ministries with consultants chosen by the
ministers,
and give the coalition control over the appointment of judges in the future. In other
words, in the absence of a written constitution and upper house of parliament,
Israel would be left without any effective checks and balances on the
government’s power. And this was just the first tranche.
From the start, Levin had the full backing of newly-elected
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, who having spent 18 months in unaccustomed
opposition, and facing a corruption case of his own, was back in power with a
vengeance. No less important, the four parties of the new coalition, extreme-Right and ultra-religious, shared Levin’s animosity
towards the independent Supreme Court they viewed as a ‘progressive judicial dictatorship’. While they had a small but stable majority in the
Knesset, the opposition was badly divided and wouldn’t put up much of a fight.
Levin predicted he would pass the legislation by the end of the winter session.
Three months later, none of that has passed. The Knesset is
about to go into its Passover recess and just one law out of Levin’s programme
has emerged from the law committee, controlled by another staunch opponent of
the Supreme Court. The Judicial Appointments Law is ready for its final reading, but it has been ‘suspended’.
On Monday night, Netanyahu announced a ‘pause’ in the
legislation, claiming that he was ‘not prepared
to tear the nation apart’. He took
his time, waiting almost until the last moment. But his reluctance is
unsurprising: Netanyahu had just spent his first three months in office
focusing nearly all his efforts on a policy that is unlikely to be passed into
law any time soon. It was blocked by a protest movement that sprung up, nearly
from nothing, and launched a campaign, revolutionary in nature but totally
bloodless, that stopped his government in its tracks.
The first weekend of protests was not promising. They were
organised on a Saturday night in Tel Aviv by a disparate group of Left-wing
movements who focused on solidarity with the Palestinians, the first obvious
victims of the nationalist government, and anti-corruption organisations who
had led the protests against Netanyahu during his previous term. They couldn’t
agree on a joint platform and the protests ended up without making a noticeable impression.
‘It was clear that we
couldn’t let either group lead the movement,’ says one of
the members of what became a coordinating committee of over 50 protest
organisations. ’There was no
way that ordinary Israelis would join a rally where they were waving
Palestinian flags, and the anti-corruption types are also seen by many as being
obsessive cranks, with good reason.’ A new set
of organisers, military veterans and business leaders, took over.
‘We realised that it
wouldn’t be a good idea to start trying to take anyone’s flags away so the best
answer was simply to flood the area with Israeli flags,’ says former
IDF
chief of staff Dan Halutz, ‘We set
up a flag factory overnight, and began bringing thousands of flags to
every rally.’
‘We got the message,
though we didn’t like it,’ says one
veteran Left-wing organiser. ‘We
sacrificed our own agenda so the middle-class would come.’ Their compromise was to stand at one side of the rallies
in ‘a bloc against occupation’, with signs, but no flags. The next weekend, 60,000 people
turned up in Tel Aviv, despite the pouring rain, while other smaller rallies
were held in cities across Israel. The numbers continued to grow.
But bringing people out onto the streets was only part of
the campaign. The real pressure came not from the numbers but the way specific
Israeli communities became political players. The first crucial addition to the
protests was the tech sector — from the CEOs and investors who threatened to
move operations abroad to the thousands of employees who not only went on
marches, but built online networks and applications for coordinating
impromptu protests outside the homes and events of cabinet ministers.
‘I’ve been trying to get
support from the tech people for years,’ said a
veteran Israeli activist. ‘They just
weren’t into politics. Now, I have CEOs coming to me and donating money and
resources for whatever we need, because they say they won’t be able to keep
their businesses here if we fail.’
The next crucial group to mobilise for the protest were the
reservists. Thousands of officers and pilots and intelligence analysts, who are
on constant call for their military units, and are often their backbone, signed
petitions stating that they would refuse ‘to serve a
dictatorship’. This particular
protest not only confirmed the ‘patriotic’ nature of the movement, but rattled the security chiefs,
who in turn warned Netanyahu of the implications. At this point, around a month
ago, Netanyahu wavered, but Levin and other coalition leaders threatened to
resign, and he refused to fold.
In the end, it was Defence Minister Yoav Gallant who broke
ranks, saying that he wouldn’t vote for laws that were causing a risk to
Israel’s national security. Netanyahu summarily fired him on Sunday night,
immediately triggering a furious wave of more protests that very night, as well
as a general strike, agreed upon by both the trade unions and employers, the
next morning. By evening, he capitulated.
In theory, Netanyahu can still bring the Judicial
Appointments Law, and the rest of the legislation, for approval by the Knesset next month.
But he is unlikely to want to risk bringing Israel back to the brink of chaos,
risking its economy, security and international standing, just to fail once
again. The protest movement doesn’t trust him and has no intention of
disbanding while he remains in power.
It is a startling reversal of fortune which leaves
Netanyahu’s party, Likud, plummeting in the polls, his image as a political
winner tarnished, and his authority over his government greatly diminished. He
has promised his coalition that this is just a temporary, tactical retreat, and
that they will regroup to pass an essentially similar reform when the Knesset
begins its summer session. He has also promised the Israeli people that he will
hold a ‘true dialogue’ with the
opposition to reach a ‘broad
agreement’ on future
constitutional changes. He can’t achieve both.
If he fails to bring the Supreme Court under government
control, he will almost certainly lose his majority as key elements of the
coalition rebel. If the reform isn’t acceptable to the opposition, the protests
will resume, invigorated by their success in facing him down the first time
around. Whatever happens, he has manoeuvred himself into a position where he
has no good options.
Worst of all for Netanyahu, he has left some of his most
faithful followers wondering whether, at 73, he has finally lost his touch, his
uncanny feel for the Israeli public’s pulse”
…...” Today, his only course of action is to play for time: to
try and string out the constitutional negotiations being held under the
auspices of President Isaac Herzog in the hope that his coalition partners
eventually tire of the issue and other events divert their attention.
Meanwhile, he will try to buy them off with vague promises, such as the one he
gave far-Right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir — that he could form
in his ministry a new ‘national
guard’, in
effect
his own private militia.
But even this can’t mask the truth: Netanyahu is now weaker
than he has ever been over the course of the 15 years he has served as prime
minister. A prisoner of his radical coalition, beaten by a protest movement
which has yet to say the final word.”
Previously, whenever he addressed
the public Netanyahu projected confidence. From the moment he adjusted the height
of the microphones, he had your attention. But with the passage of time an embattled
Netanyahu has resorted to” bending the truth.”
Apparently, it’s an age-old failing
among ageing political leaders.
Chag Pesach Sameach.
Beni
30th of March, 2023.
