by Dror Eydar
Hat tip: Jean-Charles Bensoussan
The Israeli Left has made its opinion of democracy very clear: It just gets in the way if they're not in power • That is why the Left is turning to the international community for help and dismissing anyone in Israel who didn't vote "correctly."
A voting booth in 1977, the
year the Right rose to power for the first time since the establishment
of Israel
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Photo credit: Yaakov Saar / GPO  |
1. Two weeks ago, Haaretz publisher Amos Schocken
penned an op-ed that should have sparked more controversy than a
thousand radical right-wing campaigns. In the article, titled "Only
international pressure will end Israeli apartheid," Schocken concluded,
as though it were a given, that Israel is an apartheid state and has
been an apartheid state for 50 years. Schocken didn't explain how he
arrived at this conclusion, nor did it appear that he cares one iota
about the history of apartheid as it played out in South Africa. The
falsehood that Israel is an apartheid state was mentioned 23 times in
his article, as though it was pure truth. And since Schocken does not
think that Israel will be convinced to change its policy (as though it
were really up to us), he believes that any of the measures that were
taken against the apartheid regime in South Africa are applicable to
Israel. He justified Israelis who take action against Israel around the
world, though even he admits that Israel's policy was shaped by a
"democratically elected government." So how can he justify such things?
Simple (this is the rationale that guides many of the leftist
organizations): "Any government whose policy is apartheid, which is
patently anti-democratic, forfeits the right to make claims in
democracy's name." We have the right to remain silent.
I attended a conference at the Van Leer
Jerusalem Institute this week, where I heard former head of the Civil
Service Commission Itzhak Galnoor saying "If the government decided to
stop playing by the rules of democracy, then I have too. I choose the
radical option." And what is that option? Nonviolent civil rebellion. He
justified urging the international community to come in and rescue us,
the same way the world rescued other societies from "dark" regimes
throughout history -- Japan, Germany, parts of eastern Europe and, of
course, South Africa. This to "restore democracy's glory."
For a moment I felt like I was listening to a
dinosaur -- a vestige of the worst parts of the Mapai hegemony. He and
Schocken and their gang are trying to dictate to us what democracy is,
and if we fail to fall into line, they will call in the "international
community" to put things in order around here.
2. Through the years, the Left has become a
fanatic religious cult: It has its own heteronomic rules, dictated by
some god (they must be, considering that the Left views them as absolute
truth), and they outweigh the rules of man and the opinion of the
majority. The Left's totalitarianism also comes from the same source:
Despite talking ceaselessly about human rights, there are no humans
there, only ideas. But Schocken's sentiments, which have been translated
and distributed around the world, are far more dangerous. Short of
inviting the terrorists of the world to come and butcher us, he said it
all.
In his 1983 book "How Democracies Perish,"
philosopher Jean Francois Revel spoke about the "industry of blame," a
clever mechanism whereby the West has adopted a one-sided view of its
own historical guilt. Revel described the clash between the Soviet Union
and the West like a soccer game, in which one of the teams -- the West
-- restricted itself from going beyond the half court line. Today, the
Palestinian Authority and the Islamist movements (as well as parts of
Europe) play the role of the Soviet Union in this scenario, while the
leftist organizations are helping them fight against Israel.
And yet, there is one difference: While peace
organizations were taking internal action to weaken their own countries'
stance against the Soviets, the American and British citizens were able
to walk around the streets of their cities without fearing for their
safety. The price that the West would pay for internal Soviet support
seemed far off. But that is not the case in Israel today. Left wing
activists are waging endless campaigns around the world, telling our
enemies and our haters that they are indeed justified in hating us. And
since Israel's demonic image is growing stronger, because, after all,
the evidence of our demonic nature is being presented by some of our
own, it is becoming ever more legitimate to murder Jews. Can we honestly
say that our enemies care about human rights?
3. For many years, the veteran elite in Israel
did whatever it wanted with the country. The people didn't really
intervene, even if they did vote for rival political parties. It is true
that the elite has been ousted from government, but in other fields --
academia, the media, the court system, the justice system, culture and
art -- are still dominated by the old hegemony. Professor Menachem
Mautner demonstrated that since the political upset of 1977 (when the
right-wing Likud was elected to replace the left-wing government for the
first time since the establishment of the state), the Left has
relocated its political battleground from the Knesset to the courthouse.
I will add that it is not just there -- the Left has found various ways
of bypassing the Israeli democracy. Left wing organizations are the
executive branch of this idea: Forcing Israeli society to accept the
political dictates of a minority that was once all powerful and is now
desperately clinging to positions of power.
With time, the silent majority began coming
out of its coma. The Right learned to emulate the Right's modus
operandi. Parallel organizations were established and methods were
imitated. The more experience the Right amassed, the more sophisticated
these methods became. Now, the same methods that the Left once employed
against the IDF and the state, were being employed against the Left
itself. Documentation, exposure, counter espionage, campaigns,
manipulation of the media and even a growing utilization of the court
system.
A large portion of the leftist organizations'
power comes from the fact that they disguise themselves as apolitical,
philanthropic and altruistic. After all, they are only concerned with
"human rights," not politics. The Right has now exposed them for what
they truly are -- political organizations, and in certain cases, even
non-humanist political organizations.
For decades the Left has made sure to label
its political and ideological rivals as abnormal -- settlers, extreme
rightists, messianic Jews, parasite ultra-Orthodox, nationalistic,
fascists, neo-Nazis, idol worshippers, grave kissers, and so on. Now the
tables have turned a bit. The Left now finds itself in the eye of the
storm and is forced to face the delegitimization doled out by its
rivals, as they use the Left's own methods against them. The saying
"you've made your bed, now lie in it" may very well apply in this case.
4. In the debate over the memory of the
assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, the significance of the
murder, in my view, is that violence was used as a tool of political
coercion. The murderous violence that Yigal Amir, Rabin's assassin,
employed, was enacted against the majority opinion. This is the most
fundamental principle of a democratic society. It is not just as Pirkei
Avot says, "If it weren't for the fear of government, men would swallow
each other alive"; it is imperative to agree on a set of rules in this
infrastructure of "fear of government." The majority determines the
future while considering the needs of the minority. But on truly big
questions, there is no better way to decide than majority rules. The
most fateful agreement adopted in Israel since the 1948 War of
Independence -- the agreement to divide the land as it was formulated in
Oslo -- was adopted by a majority of one vote (dissenters from the
opposition). And still, this one vote gave the government the power to
pursue a historical, extremely dangerous endeavor. Amir assassinated
this principle, without which we have no state -- not one we want to
live in or fight for.
In this regard, some leftist organizations are
essentially upholding Amir's legacy. They are assassinating the idea of
majority rules. And since no decision has been made regarding the future
of the state, and the Left's path in the opposition appears long and
arduous, a large portion of the what was once the leading elite is
turning to the world for assistance. Just like in the first century BCE,
the modern day Aristobulus and Hyrcanus are bringing Rome into
Jerusalem to decide between them, thereby putting the Jews in danger of
losing their independence and sovereignty. This time, it will not
happen.
Dror Eydar
Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=31597&hp=1
Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.
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