Israel Doesn't Need a President

The end of Shimon Peres's term in July would be an excellent opportunity to abolish the Israeli presidency. It's a largely ceremonial position that costs taxpayers a lot of money. Sure, almost all parliamentary democracies have a separate head of state, either a monarch (e.g., the UK and the Netherlands) or a president (e.g., Ireland and Italy), but just because it's a common practice doesn't mean every country has to follow the same model.

If it were up to me, I would have a three-member presidency. The prime minister, speaker of the Knesset, and the Chief Justice, the heads of the three branches of government, would be co-Heads of State. Some presidential duties would be shared by all three, like signing bills into law, while other duties would be divided between them. The prime minister would be in charge of the more executive aspects of the presidency, such as signing the credentials of Israeli diplomats and receiving the credentials of foreign ambassadors. The speaker of the Knesset would officially appoint the prime minister, comptroller and other positions elected by parliament. The Chief Justice could be in charge of pardons and commutations.

Of course, none of this will happen. Politicians like the idea of the presidency too much. Some of them dream of being elected to the position. For even more of them, having another office they have the power to elect, especially when it is the most prestigious one in the country, makes them feel all the more important.

Predicting 2012

The first week of January is almost over, and I haven't done the futile annual ritual of trying to predict the future. Let me guess what might happen, some of it wishful thinking, some of it I hope won't come true (you figure out which is which):

• Israel's Attorney General will make a final decision to indict Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman. Lieberman will resign from the cabinet, but will stay chairman of Yisrael Beitenu and will not resign from the Knesset. Faina Kirschenbaum will become Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister in his place. Lieberman will decide to stay in the coalition instead of bringing about early elections.
• It will be Ehud Barak's last full year as a member of the government. That will be the case for all ministers from his Atzmaut (Independence) Party.
• Benjamin Netanyahu will win the Likud leadership elections, since he won't have any serious opposition. In Kadima, Tzippi Livni will be forced to have leadership elections, which she will lose to Shaul Mofaz. Livni will leave Kadima with a few other MKs and form a new party. And here's a prediction for 2013: this split will lead to neither Kadima or Livni's new party winning any seats in the 19th Knesset.
• In the United States, Mitt Romney will be the Republican presidential nominee. He will pick Mike Huckabee as his running-mate (Romney-Huckabee was also my erroneous prediction in 2008). They will lose to the Obama-Biden ticket, but Republicans will gain control of the Senate and retain a majority in the House of Representatives.
• Iran will develop a nuclear warhead. Nobody attacks them before or after this happens.
• The new elected president of Egypt will put the peace treaty with Israel to a referendum, scheduled for around the same time as Mubarak's execution. The people will decide to declare the treaty null and void. The United States will halt all aid to Egypt, while Avigdor Lieberman, now the former Foreign Minister, will threaten that Israel will conquer the Sinai Peninsula for a third time in history.
• Syria's civil war will drag on all year with no foreign intervention and no end in sight.

Lieberman Defends Russian Elections

While most of the Western world is questioning whether the recent Russian parliamentary elections were fair, and while Russian protesters are being brutally suppressed, Vladimir Putin has one ally he can depend on. That would be Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, who vouched for the election's fairness and democratic practices. He should know, as fellow Yisrael Beitenu member Faina Kirschenbaum was an official foreign observer, and she claims there was nothing wrong with the election.

Lieberman, Kirschenbaum and Putin believe in democracy as the rule of the majority. The rule of the current majority, when they're part of it, that is. Then, the majority can do anything to make sure it stays the majority - starve human rights NGOs of funds, toss out votes cast for the wrong candidates, etc.

Yes, I'm sure the recent Russian elections were a model of democracy. Putinistic democracy. It is a model Lieberman would like to implement in Israel. He, members of his party, members of Likud and even members of Kadima, are working on it as we speak. He won't succeed.

The Electoral Power of Israeli Protesters

The 300,000-person protest in Tel-Aviv on Saturday night was an uplifting sight. The Israeli people are angry, and they won't take it anymore!

But then, looking at some polls that came out this weekend, it seems like the protests might be giving a false impression. According to those polls, if elections were held today, the next Knesset would look more or less the same as the current one. The Likud would get just about as many seats as it has in the current Knesset, which is true of the entire right wing & ultra-orthodox bloc. The main difference would be that Kadima would lose some seats, which would go to Labor and Meretz. Also, Ehud Barak and his new party would not get into the next parliament.

According to a Jerusalem Post/Globes poll, if the leaders of the tent protests ran as a party, they'd win 20 seats. But even then, they'd mostly take votes away from other parties on the left and center. They'd take a few seats away from Likud, too, but not enough to deny Netanyahu another term as prime minister. Besides, this is all very hypothetical, since the Tent Party probably will never be established (after all, they say they are nonpartisan). It's also very hypothetical for another reason : the next elections are only in October 2013, and none of the coalition members have any interest in early elections.

The dissatisfaction in the streets and the poll results show one thing: Israelis are not happy with Netanyahu, but see no better alternative. I can relate, though I'd never vote for Netanyahu or any of his coalition partners. While I think Tzippi Livni would be a better prime minister than Netanyahu, I think her party, Kadima, is just as crappy as Likud. The ratio of true liberals to nationalists in both parties is roughly the same.

Instead of dispairing, let's wait and see what happens during the next two years. Maybe the tents will change Israeli politics after all.

The Tent Commandments

For the first time in years, Israelis are riled up over social and economic issues, rather than war and peace. It started with Facebook and one man's war against the price of cottage cheese and continued with the Tent Cities, protesting housing prices and the general cost of living in this country.

Will these protests bring down Netanyahu? I wish, but I doubt it. Can they actually bring about change? Perhaps. To achieve something significant, here are some rules that I think are essential:

• Don't let politicians take advantage of the protests. Tent dwellers have already rebuffed attempts by the National Left movement to take over, and they should do so also with Ofer Eini, the head of the country's largest labor organization.
• Don't break up into factions. This should be a unified protest by the middle class, not several different protests belonging to different interests groups: students, young families, doctors etc. 
• Don't choose certain middle class interest groups over others. Include them all. This isn't asking too much, because a systemic solution is required.
• No bullshit solutions. Don't accept anything that won't help in significant ways.
• Don't choose a leadership. The fact that this is decentralized is part of the Tent Cities' beauty and power. Also, when there are leaders, there are factions, and as I've already said, you don't want that.

McCarthyist Initiative Tanks Again

The Knesset has resoundingly rejected two resolutions meant to set up investigative committees that would have looked into the conduct of human rights organizations and other left-wing groups. Back in February, these resolutions were withdrawn when it was clear that they would not pass. Now, when the Likud successfully passed the anti-boycott law, Avigdor Lieberman wanted to prove he was real right-winger in the government, so he brought back the issue of investigative committees.

Prime Minister Netanyahu voted against the resolution, as did many other Likud ministers and MKs. Knesset Speaker Reuven Rivlin was also a vocal opponent, having also criticized the anti-boycott bill.

For some reason, many on the left saw the anti-boycott bill as the beginning of the end of Israeli democracy, and saw the invesigative committees as the next step towards fascism. The truth is that nothing has fundamentally changed. Israel is still a vibrant yet flawed democracy. We still have free speech - and even on the question of boycotts, we haven't seen yet how judges will interpret the law. Fortunately, it seems that the Supreme Court will address the issue even before the lower courts do, and even if it doesn't strike it down, it will probably instruct judges to implement the law in a way that balances freedom of speech with the economic rights of the targets of the boycott.

Ehud Barak has come up with a good idea, though I wish he would have thought of it sooner. He has proposed an amendment to the anti-boycott law, that would cut out the part about suing individuals, and would only keep the parts about government contracts and tax benefits. That is very sensible, and I hope it passes.

Extremes, Calm the Fuck Down!

A mind-boggling hysteria has taken over Israel, esepcially its extreme left and extreme right. These two opposites feed on each other like symbiotic parasites. The nationalists fear the left's activities, and so they pass laws against boycotts and commemorating the Nakba, which, in turn, only makes people more aware of boycotts and the Nakba. The far left, fearful of these new laws, starts screaming hysterically and prematurely about the end of Israeli democracy, making the fascists seem even stronger than they really are.

Both sides need to understand that their tactics are counterproductive. They need to act more level-headedly. Of course, it's ridiculous to say this to the extremists. After all, if they listen, they'd become moderates.

Israelis Love Netanyahu

Today's New York Times has an article titled "Israelis See Netanyahu Trip as Diplomatic Failure". Unfortunately, that is the exact opposite of the truth. The media is indeed unhappy with Netanyahu, as are members of the Knesset opposition. While journalists and MKs are the article's focus, it only briefly mentions what really matters - that polls show a bump in Netanyahu's popularity.

In Ha'aretz's poll, 51% were satisfied with Netanyahu's performance as prime minister (not only regarding his US visit), while 36% were not. That's almost the reverse of his numbers just five weeks ago, when 53% were unhappy with him.

Contrary to the Times article's title, nearly half of Israelis saw Bibi's trip as a diplomatic success, while only 10% saw it as a failure. Nearly half also felt pride at seeing Bibi's address to Congress, and only 5% saw it as a missed opportunity.

Sometimes I think my fellow Israelis don't live in the Holy Land, but rather in La La Land.

Ask Netanyahu Questions

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will appear on YouTube's World View program on March 23. Internet users from Israel and around the world can send in their questions via video, text or Twitter by March 21. If I understand correctly, internet users are also the ones who choose what will be asked by voting for questions they like.

Ask away.

Netanyahu's Regression

Haaretz reported yesterday that Benjamin Netanyahu is going to change course on the peace process. He'll deliver a big speech, perhaps before the United States Congress, in which he will declare that he now wishes to reach another interim agreement with the Palestinians. This is probably the big move, the grand initiative, which he promised German Chancellor Angela Merkel he'd make.

Until recently, Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas had one basic thing in common. They both expressed a desire to reach a final peace deal and opposed more interim steps. They were far from agreeing on what would be in that final deal, and one or both of them may not have been very serious about reaching it, but at least at the declaratory level, they agreed on a basic goal.

Now, under the guise of a grand gesture that will bring peace closer, Netanyahu is actually regressing. He's doing something I thought was impossible at this low point: he has widened the gulf between Israel and the Palestinians even more. He has adopted Avigdor Lieberman's idea of a Palestinian State with temporary borders, encompassing 60% of the West Bank, which the Palestinians have repeatedly rejected. They understandably fear that the temporary will become permanent.

Netanyahu needs to come up with a real grand gesture. He needs to think of something new that has some chance of winning Palestinian and international support. He can't regurgitate old ideas that the Palestinians have consistently opposed.

McCarthyist Initiative Tanks in Israel

Two investigative Knesset committees intended to look into the funding and conduct of certain Israeli left wing organizations are now very unlikely to see the light of day. The Likud reversed course and decided to allow its Knesset members to vote as they wish in the final stage needed to approve the establishment of the committees. Yisrael Beitenu decided to indefinitely postpone the roll-call scheduled for next Monday, since Avigdor Lieberman now knows that the proposal has more opponents in the Knesset than supporters.

This is probably the worst Knesset we've ever had, with a long list of horrible bills and resolutions. Fortunately, most of those don't become law in the end. Unfortunately, people abroad tend to hear about the negative initiatives, and not about their ultimate failure.

The Skeptical Left

Einat Wilf, one of the four Knesset Members who left Labor with Ehud Barak, said that their new Independence Party is to the left of Likud and to the right of Kadima. It's a party for the people on the skeptical left who would like to see peace but aren't so sure it is possible, and do not blame Israel as the sole party responsible for the lack of of progress in peace negotiations.

First of all, it's interesting that Independence is to the right of Kadima. Is the party of Ariel Sharon and Tzippi Livni a leftist party? And a "blame Israel first party" (BIFP)? Of course it isn't. Is what remains of Labor a BIFP? Not in the slightest.

Second of all, as a member of the skeptical left, it would seem I should be a supporter of Barak. I think the Palestinians have their share of responsibility for the failure of negotiations. I am not at all convinced they've completely given up the idea of fighting for a one-state solution even after the Palestinian State is established. However, I'm not blind to our responsibilities, and I don't think we should be providing excuses for the Palestinians. Settlement construction and the demolition of Palestinian houses in East Jerusalem and the West Bank should not be taking place - most of all, because they're wrong, but also because they are excellent excuses for the Palestinians to refuse to talk to us.

The government needs to do something that would test the Palestinians' will to negotiate. Freeze settlements, give them more control over greater areas. If after big gestures like these they'll still be unwilling to negotiate, the egg will be on Mahmoud Abbas's face, not Netanyahu's.

Barak, Wilf and the other three Independence munchkins aren't pushing the government towards the bare minimum required to shift responsibility to the Palestinians. In fact, they're allowing it to go ever more rightward, toward Lieberman's abyss of racism and paranoia.

Barak Improves Labor By Leaving It

Ladies and gentlemen, the Labor party no longer has a measly 13 seats in the Knesset. No, it has an even measlier 8, after Defense Minister Ehud Barak and four loyal MKs split from Labor and created a new faction, with the pathos-filled name "Independence". The quality of the Labor MKs just rose, though, because the best ones stayed. I'm mainly referring to Avishay Braverman, the outgoing Minister of Minority Affairs, and Shelly Yechimovich.

Barak is pulling an Ariel Sharon -  a major cabinet member (prime minister or defense minister) who leaves the party of which he is the chairman with a bit more than one third of the delegation in order to create a new party that would allow him to carry out his policies. Barak's direction, however, is the opposite of Sharon's. Sharon left the Likud in order to be freed of right-wing extremists. Barak is creating a new party, which would basically be a subsidiary of Likud, in order to be freed of supporters of the two-state solution who believe Barak and Labor shouldn't serve as the right-wing extremist government's fig leaf.

Former Meretz chairman Yossi Sarid predicts the Independence Party will merge with Likud. He might be right. I doubt they'll be able to muster enough votes to get into the Knesset in the next elections.

Netanyahu and the Negev

Ari Shavit, who is considered close to both Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak, has this to say in today's Haaretz (Hebrew/English):

"[Netanyahu] will not give up sovereignty in settlement blocs in the West Bank, he will not compromise on Israeli presence in the Jordan Valley and he will try to spare the settlers. On the other hand, as far as land exchange goes, he will display readiness to go far."

This can only mean one thing. Settlers in the West Bank are much more important to him than the citizens in Israel proper, those living in areas that have been recognized as legitimate Israeli territory since 1948. He will give up a lot of Israeli land, possibly uprooting non-settlers, to keep West Bank lands and appease settlers.

He is most likely to give up lands in the Negev. Instead of telling the colonizers of the West Bank to move to Israel's southern region, he will betray the northeastern Negev. Southerners must understand this and advocate for themselves immediately. Make it clear to Netanyahu - if we must choose between Ariel and Ein Gedi, we'll choose Ein Gedi.

Of course, he might not be thinking of the Negev, but rather of Arab-populated towns on the Western side of the green line. That's Lieberman's wet dream - getting as much of the Arab-Israeli population to live in Palestine. The Israeli Arabs, the Palestinians and the international community will never agree to this, and I doubt Netanyahu would even dare bring it up.

Israel's McCarthy Committee

Last week, the Knesset took the first step toward creating an investigative committee that would look into the sources of human rights groups' funds. Faina Kirschenbaum of Avigdor Lieberman's Yisrael Beitenu Party and Danny Dannon of Likud, the two people behind the initiative to create such a committee and who are both vying for its chairmanship, claim they're only looking into groups that are targeting the IDF and promoting the prosecution of Israeli soldiers abroad.

Lieberman said today that this isn't persecution of the left, since they aren't looking into organisations like Peace Now. Peace Now is legitimate, he said, while the others are not. Odd, since even Peace Now technically fits the bill of organisations that publish unfavorable information about the IDF, such as how settlements continue to grow under the watchful eye of the army, which is legally the sovereign in the West Bank.

Anyway, I hope this committee will not be created. There are still two more votes left where this horrible idea can fail - in the Knesset Committee and in the final vote before the whole Knesset. In the original vote, only 41 Knesset members voted in favor of a committee, but because very few opponents were present that was enough. Now that both Knesset Speaker Reuven Rivlin of Likud and Opposition Leader Tzippi Livni have denounced the decision, I am much more hopeful that maybe there will be more "no" votes than "yes" votes when the final roll call comes up.

2011: Year in Preview

Happy new year!

Let's hope that this year will be better than the last, though I'm not very optimistic. Here are a few things I hope (but don't necessarily believe) will happen by January 1, 2012:

• The Labor Party will finally understand the Netanyahu government is a bad one and will withdraw from the coalition. A disargreement between the ultra-Orthodox Shas and the secular Israel Beitenu will lead to the breakup of the rest of the government and new elections. Avishay Braverman will be elected chairman of the Labor Party, and he'll make gains in the elections, ultimately becoming Prime Minister Tzippi Livni's main coalition partner.
• Prime Minister Livni will reach a settlement with Mahmoud Abbas and Salam Fayyad, creating a Palestinian state. 
• Israel and Syria will reach a peace deal. Syria will cut its ties with Hizbullah.
• Following an increase is gas prices, a new revolution will sweep through Iran, bringing a new moderate government to the country, which will also cut its ties with Hizbullah.
• Cut off from all funding and support from Iran and Syria, Hizbullah will no longer be the all-powerful terrorist militia that it is and will be forced to disarm. Hizbullah will resist at first, but a newly empowered Lebanese Army will squash any resistance. Hassan Nassrallah will be executed for treason against Lebanon.

That's what I hope will happen. Here's what I think will happen:

• The Labor Party will indeed withdraw from the coalition, but the government won't fall. Shas and Avigdor Lieberman may have opposite views on some core religious issues but their mutual right-wing views and their love of their government positions are more important to them than anything else. 
• Despite attempts to hold leadership elections in the Labor Party, Ehud Barak will manage to delay a vote.
• The Netanyahu government will not reach any kind of agreement with the Palestinians. There may be another war with Hamas.
• New peace negotiations might start with Syria, but Netanyahu's unwillingness to give up the Golan Heights, as well as Assad's unwillingness to give up his ties with Iran and Hizbullah, will lead to failed talks.
• The Ayatollahs may get rid of Mahmoud Ahmedinejad because he's a horrible president, but the new government won't be much friendlier towards the United States, Israel or the West, and it definitly will not stop aiding Hizbullah.
• Hizbullah's stranglehold on Lebanon will only increase this year.

For the Millionth Time, Fire Avigdor Lieberman!

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman gave a speech at the 65th session of the United Nations General Assembly today. He was speaking as the official representative of the State of Israel, of course, and so should have spoken about the Israeli government's official policy. That isn't what he did. Instead, he pushed his own agenda, saying peace with the Palestinians isn't possible in the next few years and that any peace deal would have to include not only land swaps but swaps of the populations on that land (meaning that technically, the people would stay put, only the border would move and, in the case of Israeli Arabs, their citizenship would change). So now, despite Benjamin Netanyahu distancing himself from Lieberman's words, this speech is now taken as the official policy of Israel by many countries. I can't blame them. After all, a foreign minister addressing the UN General Assembly is always assumed to be speaking for his country. That's part of diplomacy - when the president, prime minister or foreign minister of a country says something, it has has official significance.

Avigdor Lieberman has always been a loose cannon. Appointing him to be Israel's top diplomat was one of the most irresponsible things Netanyahu ever did. This speech at the UN should have been the final straw. In a normal country, a foreign minister who strays from official foreign policy at such an important international forum would be fired. That's what should happen in this case. I have no illusions. I know Bibi is too dependent on Yisrael Beitenu to keep his coalition together, and not losing the prime minister's seat is more important to him than Israel's standing in the world.

Ayatollah Abdallah Yussef

Imagine a senior Iranian or Palestinian cleric wishing for the death of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and all Israelis or all Jews. There would be an uproar.

On Saturday night, Ovadia Yossef, the spiritual leader of the ultra-Orthodox (Haredi) Shas party and a former chief Sephardic rabbi of Israel, wished for the deaths of Abu-Mazen and the Palestinian people. Instead of denouncing Yossef forcefully and saying he's a despicable racist, Prime Minister Netanyahu only said that the rabbi's views don't reflect the government's views. The US administration forcefully condemned the Shas leader's statement. Even the Anti-Defamation League, which recently shamefully joined the opposition to an Islamic center two blocks from Ground Zero, did the right thing this time and condemned the rabbi.

Ovadia Yossef has said some outrageous stuff over the years. For someone supposed to be a man of God, he sure does has a filthy and hateful mouth. In the past he has attacked secular Jews, Arabs, gays and other political rivals in unacceptable ways that go beyond criticism of political views or ways of life. However, it seems to me as if he has gone farther than ever before.

I can understand that Netanyahu needs Shas in order for his government not to fall apart, but he needs to find a way to condemn Yossef's words (and not just lamely distancing himself from them) without creating a crisis in the coalition. The Labor Party, if it had any backbone, would have forced him to condemn this call for genocide, albeit a genocide at the hands of God and not man.

Gabriel and I Debate on JSF (Six Months Ago)

This may be old, but it's news to me. I just found out that a debate I had in the comment section of one post on "Jews sans frontieres" in January was reproduced in another post a month later. I don't know whether to see this as a compliment or an insult. Did Gabriel see this as an interesting debate with someone who has interesting arguments that make for fertile discussion despite his disagreement with me, or is he using me as an example for Zionist ignorance and racism? I'd like to think it's the former.

I find one this curious (emphasis mine):

"When [the video] was published on JSF, I was challenged by Emmanuel Shiff, apparently a student from the Hebrew (colonial) University, about my criticism of the Israeli peace movement."

Why would he assume (wrongly, by the way) that I'm from Hebrew University? There are, after all, seven universities in Israel, five of them with political science departments.

Though it isn't my university, I'll defend it anyway. Yes, the Mount Scopus Campus of Hebrew U is in East Jerusalem, but the campus was founded in 1925, before the 1948 War, and remained Israeli territory even between 1949 and 1967, when it was an Israeli enclave sorrounded by Jordanian-controlled territory.

Raed Salah, Violent Turks and Violent Knesset Members

In a television interview today, Sheikh Raed Salakh, the radical Islamic cleric, claimed that Israeli soldiers shot one of the people onboard the Marmara because they thought it was him. Interestingly, he called his doppleganger a soldier, a "jundi" in Arabic. Would he call a peace activist, or even an unarmed pro-Gaza activist, a "soldier"? A few of the other passengers on the ship talked about becoming Shaheeds, martyrs. One even expressed regret for surviving.

Foolishly, all the Turkish citizens arrested on the flotilla were sent back to Turkey. We should have deported only those not involved in violence. Those who attacked our soldiers will now be able to join the Irish ship named after Rachel Corrie, which is currently docked in Turkey, and unless some kind of agreement between Israel, Ireland, the Free Gaza Movement and the crew of the Rachel Corrie is reached, they'll be able to attempt a repeat of the events of the Marmara.

I have to say that this whole flotilla thing is one case where I'm mad as hell at almost everyone involved, from the Israeli government to the anti-Israel "provocation activists". Yesterday, a few of our Knesset Members joined the list of people who piss me off. Yossi Sarid's reaction to the near-brawl and all the cursing was just perfect (the English version, unfortunately, dropped Sarid's lament in the end against the nationalism taking over the Knesset, by both Jews and Arabs).