“Israel goes from shock to anger, denial and fear”
“Israel goes from shock to anger, denial and fear”
JVL Introduction
What is going on inside Israel? Here we learn more about the rise and political influence of the messianic right – fundamentalism in all its horrors. People are again protesting against Netanyahu and see him as, at least partly, responsible for the fate of the hostages in Gaza. Israel is losing in many ways, in international stature and also economically. It is also losing many people such that there are shortages of doctors and teachers.
Meanwhile we also see the fear and anger generated by the October 7th attack and the consequent understanding that Israel is not invincible and, indeed, it has not despite a year of fighting with vastly superior weapons, succeeded in “eliminating Hamas”. Meanwhile many Israelis do know what is being done to Palestinians in Gaza and yet this barely enters the discourse, even while there are discussions on TV justifying torture. After all “what can you do?”
There is much of interest in this piece not least the bleak future that seems to lie ahead. “… historian Adam Raz of the NGO Akevot (footprints) Institute for Israeli-Palestinian Conflict Research, which supports investigation into the true facts of Israel’s past, believes denial feeds anxiety. Since 7 October, ‘by claiming force is the only solution, Netanyahu has made us all criminals, me included. We’re going to have to live for decades with the fact that we’ve killed tens of thousands of Palestinians” (my emphasis)
LL
This article was originally published by Le Monde Diplomatique (Sept 2024) on Wed 18 Sep 2024. Read the original here.
Israelis ask, ‘All this, for what?’
Since 7 October the ascendent ultra-nationalist, messianic right has pushed its agenda hard. But for many ordinary Israelis the prosecution of the war has raised questions about their country’s future.
Café terraces in Tel Aviv and West Jerusalem are still crowded with people enjoying espressos and croissants, as if oblivious to the war. They do talk about it, of course, recalling the terrible events of 7 October and the shock of seeing their powerful military so helpless. Then they turn to other concerns. Why dwell on such a depressing subject, especially when Gaza seems so far away (though it’s only 70km from Tel Aviv)?
‘What amazes me,’ says filmmaker Erez Pery of the audiovisual arts school at Sapir College near Sderot, barely a kilometre from the Gaza Strip, ‘is how quickly we’ve adapted. The cafés haven’t changed a bit.’ Yet ‘many people are deeply frustrated and angry. Our exasperation has reached a peak.’ Pulitzer prize winner Nathan Thrall (1) sums it up: ‘Sure, the cafés are full: it’s easy to pretend the Palestinians are invisible and carry on as normal. But people are depressed.’
We know what’s happening to the Palestinians, and it’s horrifying. But what about the people doing it to them? Debates on 24-hour news channels give the impression of huge confusion and a population turned in on itself. There’s a lot of shouting and verbal abuse. What do Israelis think will happen after the war? They’re not sure, but they would really like not to have to think about the Palestinians any more. The renowned Sanskrit scholar David Shulman puts it simply: ‘People sense a stalemate. And they’re right: Israel is indeed at an impasse. Hannah Arendt predicted all this.’ He’s referring to the way Zionism and the state of Israel have changed for the worse, as Arendt feared in 1948.
Israelis are caught between a desire for revenge that has led to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) investigating possible genocide in Gaza, and a very widespread attitude that Israeli geneticist Eva Jablonka defines as ‘wilful ignorance, a dreadful blindness to what we are doing to the Palestinians. Yes, our leaders are trying to brainwash us, but we’re a receptive audience.’
Politicians are pushing a narrative that denies, or at least glosses over, the crimes committed in Gaza, and it’s generally accepted as it matches the image Israelis would like to have of themselves: as victims, the only victims, pure and simple.
However, historian Adam Raz of the NGO Akevot (footprints) Institute for Israeli-Palestinian Conflict Research, which supports investigation into the true facts of Israel’s past, believes denial feeds anxiety. Since 7 October, ‘by claiming force is the only solution, Netanyahu has made us all criminals, me included. We’re going to have to live for decades with the fact that we’ve killed tens of thousands of Palestinians.’
Few Israelis share this view. Most are pessimistic about the future, but for a very different reason: they are furious about Israel’s most spectacular failure ever. ‘We’re in shock,’ says Avraham Burg, a former Labour member of Knesset (MK) and its speaker from 1999 to 2003. ‘The Palestinian question was supposed to have been resolved, but it has resurfaced, violently. We thought having our own state would guarantee our safety. But it’s all fallen apart, and today, Israel is the most dangerous country for Jews. Without the Americans, we’d never be able to wage this war.’
An ‘unwinnable war’
In June 1967 it took Israel just six days to defeat a coalition of three Arab states. For the last eight months, it has had 200,000 troops on the ground in Gaza but has been unable to ‘eradicate’ Hamas’s far less well equipped militia of 25,000. Sociologist Yagil Levy, an expert on the Israeli army (IDF), says that since 7 October, its mission has been to ‘restore Israel’s honour, which is based on military strength’. The humiliation is all the greater, he says, because ‘without realistic objectives or a vision for the future’, Israel is getting bogged down in an ‘unwinnable war’.
Anthropologist Yoram Bilu sums up the three major consequences of 7 October: ‘It dealt a severe blow to the sense of security provided by our military, which will take time to get over; also, it has aroused deep fears; and finally, it has accentuated Israeli society’s turn to the right.’ According to a survey by television’s Channel 12 in June, only 28% of Israelis believe the government’s objective of eradicating Hamas is still achievable. There’s a growing sense that Netanyahu is steering the country towards disaster. When IDF spokesman Rear-Admiral Daniel Hagari said in June, ‘Hamas cannot be destroyed. Hamas is an idea’, it was a slap in the face for Netanyahu. Many Israelis who had believed in their leaders until then suddenly asked, ‘All this, for what?’
The Palestinian question was supposed to have been resolved, but it has resurfaced, violently. We thought having our own state would guarantee our safety. But it’s all fallen apart, and today, Israel is the most dangerous country for Jews. Without the Americans, we’d never be able to wage this war (Avram Burg)
Meanwhile, Yehuda Shaul, a cofounder of the NGO Breaking the Silence, which collects the testimony of Israeli soldiers on IDF war crimes, believes this failure could have a positive impact in the long term. ‘If Netanyahu bears primary responsibility for our situation today – and many people think he does – that means Hamas isn’t the only cause of our problems. So we can start to think differently.’ Nevertheless, many Israelis believe the government has no choice but to pursue the war.
Recent polls suggest that in a general election, the opposition centrist coalition would beat the ruling right and far right by a small margin. The pro-settler, religious far right is not growing significantly, but political analysts agree that it is imposing its agenda. Under pressure from ministers Itamar Ben Gvir and Betzalel Smotrich, the government is using the war to try to install an authoritarian regime. In July, journalist Orly Noy inventoried measures adopted by the Knesset in the last eight months, legislation currently being debated and expected decisions (2).
They include the ‘IDF and Shin Bet Certification Law’, which ‘makes it easier for those bodies to penetrate private computers … to erase, alter or disrupt materials on them without the knowledge of the computer’s owner and without permission from a court’; a proposed ‘Likes Law’, which seeks to ‘penalise the mere act of “liking” social media posts that “incite terror” ’ (ie support Palestinian rights); the forced closure of the local offices of Al Jazeera, the only media network offering a first-hand view of events in Gaza; and the arrest of hundreds of Palestinian citizens of Israel (see Arab-Israeli coexistence at breaking point, in this issue) for expressing solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza.
‘Treacherous leftist Jews’
On 11 July, under intense pressure, television’s Channel 13 fired its best-known investigative journalist, Raviv Drucker, whom Netanyahu scorns but also fears because of the impending legal proceedings against him. There are many other signs that a ‘strong’ regime is being established. In public debate, there is growing talk of ‘fifth columnists’, ‘treacherous leftist Jews’ and ‘useful idiots’ to Hamas. Urban anthropologist Daniel Monterescu notes that self-censorship is becoming widespread in intellectual circles. Culture minister Miki Zohar says that in future the state will only fund ‘apolitical’ films.
According to Thrall, ‘the horrifying images that soldiers are posting of abuses in Gaza express a sense of emasculation. Everything we’ve seen in the last nine months is about vengeance, revenge.’ The military’s lack of inhibition is spreading to the general population. Israeli leaders use ‘alarmingly violent’ language when criticising the ICJ investigation, Thrall notes. And if they can use foul language, why should ordinary people do anything different?
The revelation that Palestinians held at the shadowy Sde Teiman detention facility had been tortured caused no public outcry. When the father of a soldier detained there dared to criticise the way the war in Gaza was being run, a Likud MK shouted, ‘Fuck off!’ On Tel Aviv’s Ayalon Highway ring road, a huge billboard reads ‘Expel the traitors!’ ‘In short,’ says psychologist Yohanan Yuval, ‘we’re disregarding history, and it’s working out really well for us.’
I’m glad my son teaches in New York and my brother has moved to London. I love and hate this country. But after what we’ve done, it will be very hard to rebuild a decent society. We’re more likely to descend into fascism Eva Jablonka
In late July, when Israeli military police came to arrest ten soldiers accused of ‘severely abusing’ a Palestinian prisoner at Sde Teiman, far-right activists, led by national security minister Itamar Ben Gvir and other politicians, attempted to block them. President Isaac Herzog stated that ‘hatred of people accused of acts of terrorism is understandable and justified’. And justice minister Yariv Levin described the way the soldiers were arrested as if they were dangerous criminals as unacceptable. Only opposition leader Yair Lapid publicly condemned Levin’s sedition, which the other members of the government had backed.
The far right seems less despondent. It knows what it wants and isn’t holding back. Only the messianic movement seems to promise Israelis a glorious and victorious future, including the annexation of the West Bank, Gaza and even southern Lebanon, and the restoration of security through total annihilation of the enemy. Rabbi Eliyahu Mali, head of the Shirat Moshe yeshiva in Jaffa, says Israel is pursuing a ‘religious war’ (3), and that Jewish law calls for every Palestinian in Gaza to be killed – men, women, children and elderly alike.
The messianic movement has grown considerably in recent decades. It’s led by people known in Israel as Khardelim (khar for kharedi – ‘those who fear God’ or the ultra-orthodox – and dl for the dati leumi or religious nationalists). These two groups have been moving closer for a generation, resulting in an ultra-nationalist, messianic form of Judaism. Their supporters aim to rebuild the Temple on the site of the Al-Aqsa mosque, Islam’s third holiest site.
‘Sometimes you have to help God’
A doctor practising near Jaffa who is fiercely opposed to messianic Judaism says the Khardelim see 7 October as a nes Elohim (a divine miracle): ‘They think the time of Yehoshua ben Nun [the biblical Joshua, who conquered the land of Canaan] has returned.’ He notes that a popular expression among the Khardelim is ‘Sometimes you have to help God to act’. Their military religious schools teach them that Palestinians are sub-human monsters. There are now 33 such schools, educating the cream of the IDF’s most murderous units, including the notorious Netzah Yehuda (Judah Forever) battalion.
According to Yair Leibl, a researcher with the centre-left Molad thinktank, ‘the messianic faction has built a hugely powerful apparatus that dominates both thought and communication in Israel.’ And its future looks rosy: 54% of students preparing for university entrance in its schools are children of Khardelim, says historian Adam Raz (the ultra-religious have twice the average number of children). Filmmaker Erez Pery says, ‘The standoff between secular and religious Jews will be more important than anything in determining our future. If the secular Jews win, it will still be possible to resolve other issues, starting with the Palestinian question, the most important of all. If the messianic faction win, it’ll be the end.’
The end of Israel? It seems unimaginable. But then, why do so many Israelis – not just on the far left – talk about it so much? They are often opponents of Netanyahu and his allies. They are also the majority of those who demonstrate daily against the prime minister. On the evening of 26 June they gathered outside the defence ministry on Tel Aviv’s Begin Road. There were only around 4,000 of them, but it was a Wednesday, and on some Saturdays there have been as many as 150,000. They chanted ‘264 days, that’s enough’ (the time the remaining hostages had been held by Hamas). They wore T-shirts printed with ‘Government of liars’ and ‘Murderers’ – not because of what Israel is doing to the Gazans, but because the government has allowed some of the hostages to die.
Documentary filmmaker Anat Even says, ‘Unfortunately, most of them resolutely ignore the Palestinian issue in their demands.’ On the fringes of the demonstration around 40 people had placards reading ‘Ceasefire now!’ At one point they briefly brandished a Palestinian flag.
The anti-settler Israeli left is isolated. Breaking the Silence’s Yehuda Shaul estimates it is ‘1% of the population at most’. Yet in the last few months, there have been signs of growing opposition to the government. On 13 May, 900 parents of soldiers serving in Gaza signed a petition to end this ‘reckless’ war (4). In June, 42 IDF reservists, including some officers, published an open letter declaring that they would refuse to go to Gaza if called up (5). Raz, who has two children, says, ‘I have no intention of allowing them to fight in Gaza again ten years from now, just to satisfy the messianic movement.’ Discontent is growing on the fringes of Israeli society, and not just in anti-settler circles.
Though Israelis automatically reject international criticism of their military’s war crimes as antisemitism, the continual degradation of Israel’s national image has become hard to bear. No Arab state has broken off diplomatic relations with Israel, but a major turning point came this April, when US senator Elizabeth Warren referred to ‘genocide’ in Gaza, and the expression ‘pariah state’ started to be heard. The foreign ministry’s website advises Israeli citizens travelling abroad, not to speak Hebrew on public transport or wear Israeli or Jewish symbols openly. This is precautionary advice, but in the past, Israeli travellers were not in danger of being called criminals. ‘More and more businesses are concealing their Israeli identity to keep selling their products,’ Thrall says.
Professionals are leaving Israel
And then there are those leaving Israel, perhaps as many as 100,000 in the first six months of the Gaza war. No exact figures are available, but childcare places have suddenly become available in Tel Aviv. ‘An unprecedented number of intellectuals, scientists and artists have left in the last eight months,’ says geneticist Eva Jablonka. Many have gone to Greece or Cyprus, just an hour’s flight away. Anthropologist Yoram Bilu says a taxi driver in Athens told him, ‘These days, nearly all my passengers are Russian or Israeli.’ Raz speculates that some may have left for good because they can no longer face living in Israel. Many aged 35-45 have moved to the US or Germany because they have the financial means to do so, or marketable skills.
Others have stayed on, but are at the end of their tether. Raz, 41, feels he embodies ‘the dilemma facing those who can’t stand this country any longer, but don’t want to, or can’t, leave’. Jablonka, in her 70s, is more direct: ‘I’m glad to say my son teaches sociology at New York University, and my brother has moved to London. I both love and hate this country – this is where they speak my language, and this is my landscape. But after what we’ve done, it will be very hard to rebuild a decent society. I think we’re more likely to descend into fascism.’ A growing number of Israelis share her anxiety: ‘Our leaders are insane. Ben Gvir and Smotrich couldn’t be ministers anywhere else, not even North Korea,’ Bilu says. According to Pery, ‘Till now, people have never felt the country was so close to collapse.’
Two major reasons for Israel’s decline keep coming up in conversation. First, the economy. Moody’s has downgraded Israel’s credit rating. Intel, which was planning to invest $15bn in developing its facility in Israel, suspended the project in June. Renowned Israeli economists Eugene Kandel (economic advisor to Netanyahu) and Ron Tzur, believe the country is headed for collapse (6).
The biggest fear, however, is war with Hizbullah. In late July, when I finished this article, the ‘war in the north’ had not yet started, and Israeli public opinion was still sharply divided. The IDF general staff were keen to restore their reputation, according to political scientist Menahem Klein of Bar Ilan University. In June many people were saying, ‘If we don’t do it now, we’ll never do it.’ And the 70,000 people evacuated from northern Israel were only prepared to return if the IDF continued to occupy a 30km security zone in southern Lebanon – which many Israelis fear would lead to all-out conflict.
Klein believes ‘those in favour of fighting Hizbullah are suffering from amnesia.’ They forget the IDF’s run of bad luck in southern Lebanon between 1982 and 2000, and the 2006 war against Hizbullah, which Israel lost. No one knows for certain how well armed Hizbullah is today, but it surely has more sophisticated weapons and in larger numbers than in 2006. IDF expert Yagil Levy says, ‘With every fresh report on Hizbullah’s capacity to carry out reprisals, the IDF’s fatigue, and the unprecedented potential for the destruction of Israeli cities, people are becoming less confident.’ Hundreds of thousands are thought to have purchased emergency generators and be stockpiling bottled water and dried food.
Above all, the prospect of war in Lebanon has revived the fear that Israel will disappear. Shlomo believes that ‘in 30 years, maybe sooner, this country will no longer exist – it’s inevitable.’ Molad researcher Yair Leibl says, ‘We must change course. If we don’t, Israel has no future.’ Many people I have spoken to since 7 October say they are now much more worried that Israel will vanish. In February Haaretz editor in chief Aluf Benn published a long article titled ‘Israel’s Self-Destruction’ (7).
Some are still searching for reasons to hope. ‘I don’t believe Israel is on the point of vanishing,’ Klein says. But the country has ‘changed a lot’ in ways he doesn’t approve of. Yehuda Shaul believes Israel can change: ‘More and more people are realising that not everything can be resolved by force. That’s a small change, but an important one.’ I will give the final word to David Shulman: ‘Some mornings, I think an anti-settler movement is emerging in Israel. Because if people are demonstrating to demand the release of Israeli hostages, it means they are actually admitting this is a disaster. But the next day, I wake up feeling that Israel is heading for collective suicide.’
Sylvain Cypel is a journalist and the author of The State of Israel vs the Jews, Other Press, New York, 2021. An updated French edition, L’État d’Israël contre les Juifs: Après Gaza, was published this year by La Découverte, Paris.
Translated by Charles Goulden
(1) For A Day in the Life of Abed Salama: Anatomy of a Jerusalem Tragedy, Metropolitan, New York, 2024.
(2) Orly Noy, ‘Only an anti-fascist front can save us from the abyss’, +972 Magazine, 4 July 2024, www.972mag.com/.
(3) ‘Yaffa Rabbi: “According to Jewish Law, all Yaffa residents must be killed” ’, 9 March 2024, www.middleeastmonitor.com/.
(4) ‘900 soldiers’ parents urge military to halt “deathtrap” offensive in Gaza Rafah’, 13 May 2024, www.firstpost.com/.
(5) Liza Rozovsky, ‘Three Israeli army reservists explain why they refuse to continue serving in Gaza’, Haaretz, Jerusalem, 27 June 2024.
(6) ‘Social upheaval will lead Israel to collapse in coming years: Study’, 22 May 2024, thecradle.co/.
(7) Aluf Benn, ‘Israel’s Self-Destruction: Netanyahu, the Palestinians, and the Price of Neglect’, Foreign Affairs, New York, 7 February 2024.
https://www.jewishvoiceforlabour.org.uk/article/israel-goes-from-shock-to-anger-denial-and-fear/