Israel lurches into fascism

[IndianaGreen]

Sunday, 15 February 2009

Israel lurches into fascism

Ali Abunimah

Whenever Israel has an election, pundits begin the usual refrain that hopes for peace depend on the “peace camp” - formerly represented by the Labour Party, now by Tzipi Livni’s Kadima - prevailing over the anti-peace right, led by the Likud. This has never been true, and makes even less sense as Israeli parties begin coalition talks after Tuesday’s election.

Yes, the “peace camp” helped launch the “peace process”, but it did much more to undermine the chances for a just settlement. In 1993, Labour prime minister Yitzhak Rabin signed the Oslo accords. Ambiguities in the agreement - which included no mention of “self-determination” or “independence” for Palestinians, or even “occupation” - made it easier to clinch a short-term deal. But confrontation over irreconcilable expectations was inevitable.

While Palestinians hoped the Palestinian Authority, created by the accord, would be the nucleus of an independent state, Israel viewed it as little more than a native police force to suppress resistance to continued occupation and colonial settlement in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Collaboration with Israel has always been the measure by which any Palestinian leader is judged to be a “peace partner”.

Rabin, according to Shlomo Ben-Ami, a former Israeli foreign minister, “never thought this will end in a full-fledged Palestinian state”. He was right. Throughout the “peace process”, Israeli governments, regardless of who led them, expanded Jewish settlements in the heart of the West Bank, the territory supposed to form the bulk of the Palestinian state.

In the 1990s, Ehud Barak’s Labour-led government actually approved more settlement expansion than the Likud-led government that preceded it, headed by Netanyahu. Barak, once considered “dovish”, promoted a bloodthirsty image in the campaign, bolstered by the massacres of Gaza civilians, he directed as defence minister.

http://www.alarabiya.net/views/2009/02/15/66483.html

[hack89]

1. There is another word that has lost all meaning. nt

[Idealism]

2. Just wondering- how would you describe Avigdor Lieberman?

[hack89]

3. A far right, bigoted nut case. nt

[Idealism]

4. Does his dementia not extend past bigotry?

I would think if someone in the GOP party started advocating expulsion of all African-Americans back to Africa if they didn't sign loyalty oaths to the state (and perhaps even if they did), then we would use harsher words than merely bigoted.

[hack89]

5. True, but what does this have to do with Israel being a fascist state?

give me a call when all his policies(and fantasies) are implemented.

[Idealism]

8. Consider the source of this article, for one

Unfortunately, the Arab media can be prone to ranting and poor word choices that can undermine their cause. Words like "Holocaust" and "genocide" are being abused.

I think Israel, with this past election, has moved towards a degree of fascism. I personally would not call them a fascist state, fascist regime, etc., but there has been a shift towards some of the same tendencies as you would find in fascist states. Take for instance the "loyalty oaths" that Lieberman would require. In the 1970s and 1980s, several South American military oligarchy's and dictatorships required absolute "loyalty" from their citizens- mainly leftists and trade unionists who opposed the newly-installed government and their policies. The true problem of these loyalty oath's are their ambiguous nature: How do you define disloyalty to the state? If you speak out against a military operation, you may be disloyal according to some people. This concept can be used to systemically strip the rights of citizens- as it has in the past- and it isn't being condemned by any but the far-left parties in Israel. During the election campaign, Barak threw his hat into the hawk-fest, claiming Lieberman to be a "sheep in hawk's clothing," because he never killed any Palestinians (Barak was in the elite Sayeret Matkal unit, and took part in several high-level operations that assassinated PLO leadership positions).

When you take into consideration the wide-spread support Lieberman has among the youth of Israel, you begin to understand how the future of Israeli politics will be far-right at best, with potential to move towards overt fascism. It will take a strong U.S. government to restrain these impulses and I hope we are in a position to do so in the next 10-20 years.

[hack89]

16. Ali Abunimah is a co-founder of Electronic Intifada

it is harder to imagine a more bias source. That is why it is easy to discount his hyperbole.

[Idealism]

17. You may discount his hyperbole of a fascist state, but don't dismiss the argument

There has been more than a right-ward shift in Israel, when you have such utter racism enter into the political discourse and instead of rejection by the people- he is now one of the most influential people in that country.

The word usage may be poor on this article, but do not let that and your own opinions interfere with reasoning behind the rhetoric.

[IndianaGreen]

23. Had Israel withdrawn from all the lands taken in 1967, there wouldn't have been any intifadas

and no loss of human life and dignity.

[hack89]

24. And if the Arabs hadn't have started and lost several wars

there would not have been any loss of human life and dignity.

[oberliner]

26. Withdrawn and turned them over to whom?

Jordan and Egypt?

Why didn't they establish an independent Palestinian state during their two-decade long occupation of the West Bank and Gaza?

[LeftishBrit]

6. Very true

I do consider Lieberman's party as essentially fascist. But many countries have such parties; and in some Europaean countries, for example, they've been quite influential. The question is whether he will be given power - and I very much hope not. Certainly he will not be granted the full power to turn Israel into a 'fascist state'.

[Idealism]

13. The future looks grim

Did you hear the Lieberman handily won the High School mock elections in Israel? What does that tell us about the next 10-20 years of Israeli politics?

[oberliner]

18. 10 schools - not a representative sample

Not statistically significant.

[Idealism]

20. Why would they only do 10 schools?

Every high school in the US participates in a mock election that I know of. Hell, even some middle schools do.

Do you have the article that says that?

[oberliner]

21. It was initiated by a stand-up comedian and producer

And was run at ten schools.

Here is an article with some more info:

The successful stand-up comedian, Shabi Zaraya, who initiated the mock elections together with the producer Ben Ravsky at this and nine other schools, was standing close by.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1053625.html

[Idealism]

They apparently do mock elections at more schools than in the study

but for some reason this article is only on those that these two people monitored. ither way, Labor is only mentioned as winning one, with Likud and Yisrael Beiteinu as the strongest parties.

[oberliner]

27. It's my understanding that it was only ever Blich that conducted mock elections

I know they are well-known for doing so - and generally being a fairly accurate predictor for the actual election results.

[Idealism]

28. The article seems to say they are a popular predictor

but I didn't read that they were the only school to participate in them, only that they were the barometer.

[oberliner]

30. Here are some older article excerpts

Tuesday, February 28, 2006 -- Kadima won an overwhelming majority at the Blich High School in Ramat Gan, where mock elections - traditionally staged several weeks before every national election - took place on Monday.

http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P1-119132711.html

PRIME Minister Shimon Peres and the left-wing bloc won a sweeping victory yesterday in the mock elections at Ramat Gan's Blich High School.

Peres received 61% of the votes in the elections for prime minister, compared with Likud leader Binyamin Netanyahu's 39%, while the left-wing bloc received 56% of the votes and the right-wing bloc 38%.

In the votes for individual parties, Labor received 46%, the Likud-Tsomet list 36%, Meretz 10%, the Third Way 6% and Moledet 2%.

The Blich mock elections are taken seriously because they have accurately "predicted" the results of the Knesset elections in three previous election years.

http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P1-1729882.html

[Idealism]

31. Doesn't this reinforce what I just opined?

That other schools do the mock election, but Blich just happens to predict the winner more of the time, so people pay attention to their results?

[oberliner]

32. No - it used to be just Blich, that's why this guy decided to do more schools

"Everyone always runs to the Blich school in Ramat Gan to see how the pupils vote. We said that we should in a number of schools, as part of a 'democracy day,'" Zaraya explains.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=1053625&contrassID=2&subContrassID=5

[Idealism]

33. I'll find an answer in a few days to the question

of if they do mock elections in other schools in Israel besides Blich. Gotta make a few phone calls :)

[oberliner]

34. Here is another article on the subject

As the principal of the Blich High School in Ramat Gan, a suburb of Tel Aviv, he oversees the education of the school's 1,842 students.

But the 36-year-old and his predecessors in the job also hold a unique place in Israeli political folklore.

Since 1969, the students of this high school have voted in mock elections for the mainstream Israeli political parties ahead of upcoming national elections.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4785362.stm

[eyl]

7. well, to be fair

he doesn't actually advocate expelling them - rather, he want to redraw the borders so that concentrations of Arabs are outside of Israel (note that under his proposal Israel would lose land) and then strip them of citizenship.

[Idealism]

9. "No loyalty, no citizenship" may not necessarily mean only Israeli Arabs

In other countries that have leveled similar promises, it was used to crush dissent of any government policies. The best example of this that I can think of is Chile under Pinochet, Uruguay under Bordaberry, and Brazil under military oligarchy rule from the 1960s until late in the 1980s.

The thing that bothers me the most about Lieberman is that he is being embraced, rather than scolded. Israeli teenagers love him, apparently, which does not bode well for the future of Israeli politics.

[Alamuti Lotus]

11. Who made this goon the litmus test for citizenship anyway?

He's an invader from Russia, he has no connections to Palestine. Yet he has given himself the right to say that Arabs who have lived there for a thousand years are bad citizens... Apparently, with the will of a good many people backing him up on such arguments, which reveals great problems existing within said people. The lesson there is disturbing, but a modern trend elsewhere as well--there are few places of the world that are not in a backwards trend (I can think of only Latin America that is moving in a positive direction, but I am sure this will be shut down soon enough as well).

[Idealism]

12. One way to fit in is to demonize the unpopular other.

The thing that worries me the most is how Lieberman's racist promises resoundingly won the High Schools mock elections. It promises to be an interesting next decade for Israel's political system, and not in a good way :(

[oberliner]

19. 10 schools - not a representative sample

And he did not "resoundingly win" them.

[IndianaGreen]

15. And they eat pork!

:puke:

[oberliner]

22. Don't like secular Jews?

What does eating or not eating pork have to do with anything?

[IndianaGreen]

25. Everything!

Which is why Lieberman's party wants to change the rules for conversion and marriage, watering down basic principles.

[oberliner]

29. Isn't that a positive thing?

I thought you were a secularist!

[azurnoir]

38. Why do I get the feeling

that you and IG both are playing "devils advocate"

[oberliner]

39. Can't speak for the other poster you mentioned

But as far as I am concerned, being secular rather than religious is not the aspect of Lieberman's party that bothers me.

[azurnoir]

40. Well IG is a socialist

so that would also indicate that she is at the very least secular, if not atheist and I have gotten the impression that you could be more religious not Haredi by any means but not secular either.

Of course I could be wrong too.

edited to add being secular is about IMO the only good thing about Liebermans party

[oberliner]

41. I do not think religion should play a major role in government

Certainly not to the extent that the religious parties in Israel would like to see happen.

[azurnoir]

42. Well we agree on something n/t

[LeftishBrit]

35. So what's so wrong with that? (speaking as a secular Jew myself)

I can see that there's plenty wrong with it from the point of view of a Shas supporter; but I thought *you* were pro-secularism and suspicious of the influence of religion on politics in the Middle East and the world in general?

(How many people are using your account???)

[Alamuti Lotus]

10. Did Feiglin sneak in?

I knew he was initially high on Likud's initial ticket, then dropped down a bit due to the bad press.. I forget his final MK position on the ticket.

[oberliner]

14. No he did not

His final position was 36 - Likud won 27 seats.

[LeftishBrit]

36. WOW - if there's ONE piece of good news, it's that!!!

I hadn't picked up on that bit of news, so thanks, Oberliner!

[Scurrilous]

37. Lieberman’s Rise Could Strain Relations With U.S.

<snip>

"With Avigdor Lieberman poised to play the role of coalition kingmaker after Tuesday’s Israeli electoral tangle, some Jewish groups here are readying a hasbara campaign aimed at convincing Americans that the Yisrael Beiteinu leader is not the racist and political extremist portrayed in the Israeli and international media.

But in private, several Jewish leaders said that if Lieberman does emerge from Tuesday’s inconclusive election with an important and visible role, Israel’s image will suffer yet another serious blow and the next government could be headed toward new clashes with an administration in Washington committed to restarting stalled negotiations.

Even after almost all the votes were counted, the outcome of the election remains in doubt as both Kadima leader Tzipi Livni and Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu claim victory — and as both scramble to assemble viable coalitions. The results almost guarantee a protracted period of political chaos that will effectively put the new Obama administration’s nascent peace efforts on hold.

The likeliest outcome may be a Likud-led coalition that includes Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu (“Israel is Our Home”) and other right-wing parties, said historian Michael Oren, who argued that Lieberman is “not an extremist, he’s just unconventional.”

But his potential role in the next Israeli government “doesn’t bode well for U.S.-Israel relations,” he said. “It will be very upsetting to people in Washington.”

The other possible outcome — a broad national-unity government under Livni that also includes Labor and Likud — would be so divided on critical issues involving negotiations with the Palestinians that it would be virtually paralyzed. That would also be a source of frustration, if not friction, with a new administration that has already appointed a top-level envoy to probe for peace openings.

A major role for Lieberman in a Likud-led government could “mean a greater chance for conflict with the Obama administration,” said Robert Lieber, a professor of government at Georgetown University, who stressed that he believes such an outcome is unlikely.

But other observers say a strong Lieberman role is all but assured. Atlantic blogger and veteran Mideast journalist Jeffrey Goldberg said on Wednesday it is not inconceivable Lieberman could end up as defense minister in a Likud-led government."

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