You too, (Et tu) Benny? - by David M. Weinberger

Lt. Gen. Gantz seems to be suggesting unilateral Israeli withdrawals and another disengagement. This is both frightening and clarifying.

David M. Weinberg..
A Citadel Defending Zion..
08 February '19..
Link: https://www.davidmweinberg.com/2019/02/08/et-tu-benny/

Benny Gantz, chairman of the new Israel Resilience Party, got off to a fine start last week with a smooth speech. My esteemed Jerusalem Post columnist colleague Prof. Gil Troy enthused that it was an “oratorical grand slam” and a “testament to temperament” which “showed how to dream and build.”

I’ll grant that Gantz has charmed the Israeli electorate with soaring Zionist rhetoric, and his rising poll numbers reflect this. His sunny deportment offers a counterpoint to Prime Minister Netanyahu’s negative campaign messaging. And let’s face it, Netanyahu has been in office for a very long time, and some voter fatigue is setting in.

But when evaluating Lt. Gen. (ret.) Gantz’s suitability to lead Israel, inevitably we must seek-out his defense and diplomatic worldview, and this has been hard to discern; purposefully so.

There was, however, one roaring policy hint in his inaugural speech. Gantz said that “if it turns out that there is no way to reach peace (with the Palestinians) at this time, we will shape a new reality. Israel will not be deprived of its status as a strong, Jewish and democratic state.”

‘Shaping a new reality’ is code for unilateral Israeli action in Judea and Samaria; withdrawals in the West Bank; disengagement from settlements – without peace or any diplomatic concessions from the Palestinians.

Gantz went further in an interview with Yediot Ahronot this week, where he praised the unilateral Gaza withdrawal and the destruction of Gush Katif towns, saying that it was “carried out with a lot of political consideration,” “done legally,” and “handled well.”

“We must take the lessons of the disengagement and implement them in other areas,” he added ominously.

This is both frightening and clarifying. It suggests that Gantz would willingly repeat the mistakes of Prime Minister Sharon, and that in Resilience Party parlance the self-referential term “centrist” in really means “leftist.”

Gantz’s spokesmen mightily are trying to wiggle-out of these remarks, contending that the reference to “lessons” in his interview referred only to the importance of preventing a rift in the nation (really?) and making sure that any future border decisions include strict security provisions (sure).

But Gantz’s hints at unilateral Israeli withdrawal don’t come in a vacuum. They have a pedigree. For seven years, center-left generals and Barak-Olmert era officials have been pumping plans for more unilateral Israeli withdrawals.

The speech that wasn’t aired live - by Sivan Rahav-Meir

Eliezer Shkedi, Eliezer ben Moshe Mendel Shkedi, stepped down from the podium to the sound of loud, lengthy applause. No survey was taken the next day, and no mandates were counted up, but I think that during these days of campaigning, this is a speech worth listening to.

Sivan Rahav-Meir..
Yediot Aharonit/JNS..
04 February '19..

I don’t want to write about Benny Gantz’s momentum. Why not? Because of what was already said here about Avi Gabbay’s momentum. Here are a few tidbits I pulled out of my computer archives this week:

“Mazal tov! Israel has a newborn opposition party. And everyone’s talking about it.” (The surveys were giving Gabbay 24 mandates, 24 Knesset seats.) “Gabbay has identified all the hottest ingredients in the Israeli salad—ethnicity, Judaism, Arabs, the disputed territories—and put them all on his message board. It’s a credible mix.”

“Avi Gabbay is leaving his plough marks all over the Land of Israel. For the past hundred days he’s been traveling, visiting and speaking, mainly in places where they don’t vote Labor.”

I also found the cliché, “Something new is beginning.” It wasn’t long ago that wrote all that. So what happened? And what might happen to Gantz as well? Experts explain that binge-watching has become popular today because people no longer have the patience to wait. We want it all right now, so we can finish it to the last drop and move on to the next thing. The Gabbay binge is over; the voters have cast him aside so they can focus on their new addiction, Gantz, until they finish the season. Only in this case, the season may end well before April 9.

* * *

The seasoned military man stepped up to the podium, started speaking and impressed the whole audience. I’m not talking about Gantz, but about Reserve Maj. Gen. Eliezer Shkedi, who spoke at a recent lecture day held in memory of Lt. Col. Emmanuel Moreno.

“I want to speak about four things,” he said, “all of which I learned from my father.

(Continue to Full Column)

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Is Fear of Being a "Frier" The Key Dynamic in Coalition Forming Process?

Dr. Aaron Lerner..
IMRA Weekly Commentary..
21 February '13..




It has been said that Israelis fear being a "frier" [being a patsy] more than dying.

This may very be the key dynamic explaining pretty much every actor in any way associated with the coalition forming process today.

Bennett doesn't want to end up being a patsy in agreeing to join the coalition only to find himself either not in the final coalition or in a coalition that adopts either policies or makes appointments that make him look like a patsy. Consider the national laughing stock he would be today, for example, if Bennett had already announced he was joining the coalition without finalizing policy principles first and he learned from news reports, after the fact, that Livni was being appointed to negotiate with the Palestinians.

The silence of pretty much all the Likud MKs to the Livni appointment also reflects their "fear of friering". Livni may want to divide Jerusalem, transfer Ariel to the Palestinians and serve witness before the world that various harebrained schemes are indeed viable. But if the Palestinians never agree to talk the appointment will be bereft of meaning. And any Likud MKs who lost their chance to be a minister or hold a select position in the Knesset because they voiced their opposition to the appointment would, after the fact, be patsies.

Yair Lapid would also be a patsy if he joined the coalition and none of the agenda that got him elected was implemented.

IMRA Observation - President Peres Cannot have It Both Ways

Dr. Aaron Lerner..
IMRA..
30 December '12..

When representatives of the Likud Party responded today to public remarks made by President Shimon Peres that criticized Netanyahu for not finding a partner for peace in Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, Labor chairwoman Shelly Yacimovich responded by saying that "The Likud's lashing out at the president of the country, one of the symbols of the state of Israel, is aggressive and contemptible."

But Mr. Peres cannot have it both ways.

If he wants to enjoy the immunity from criticism of a president of Israel, he has to limit himself to his apolitical presidential functions.

But if Mr. Peres wants to participate in the rough and tumble of the policy debate – in particular in weeks before the national elections, then it is an affront to the very lifeblood of the democratic process for those who disagree with his views to be forced into silence.

Because the moment that we enter the policy debate, then to be frank about it, Mr. Peres is painfully short on depth.

What Could Make an Israeli Party Dangerous?

Jonathan S. Tobin..
Commentary/Contentions..
02 December '12..

Polls don’t show former Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni’s new political party having much of an impact on the Israeli electorate, but she is enjoying some success in attracting veteran politicians to her banner. Seven members of the Kadima party that she led in the last elections have jumped over to the Movement, as her party is dubbed. More importantly, she has attracted Amram Mitzna, a former leader of the Labor Party to run with Livni. Mitzna, who led Labor in the 2003 election against Ariel Sharon’s Likud, is likely to be named to the number two slot under Livni. In announcing his decision, Mitzna denounced the administration of Prime Minister Netanyahu as a “failed government” and said the right-wing tilt of the Likud Knesset list made it “dangerous.”

But Mitzna, who was highly regarded for his service as a general in the Israeli army and as mayor of Haifa, is hardly in a position to say the ideas of his opponents are dangerous. Mitzna is, after all, one of the original advocates of one of the worst decisions in the country’s history: the unilateral withdrawal from Gaza that led to the creation of a Hamas terrorist state on Israel’s doorstep.

Tobin - Israeli Spook Revolt is Politics as Usual

Jonathan S. Tobin..
Commentary/Contentions..
29 April '12..

The international press is doing its best to hype critical remarks about Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu uttered by Yuval Diskin, the retired head of the Shin Bet security service into a sign that the government is in trouble. Diskin, a respected figure that retired last year is the latest veteran spook to express his disdain for Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak and their stance on the nuclear threat from Iran. That there is a debate in the highest intelligence circles about what the best strategy for dealing with Iran has never been a secret. But what Diskin’s comments and other attacks on Netanyahu from former Mossad chief Meir Dagan reflect is not so much a revolt of the experts against the politicians but a standard trope of Israeli politics in which those who are frustrated about the fact that their ideas have not won the support of the Israeli public seek to overturn the verdict of democracy by appealing to the press and international opinion. It is no more likely to succeed now than in the past.

Though foreign news outlets treated Diskin’s remarks, as a huge story that can be spun as part of a negative trend for Netanyahu even the left-wing press in Israel is skeptical about that. Haaretz’s Yossi Verter noted that the personal nature of Diskin’s rant against Netanyahu and Barak at what he termed a “gathering of defense establishment pensioners” undermined their credibility. Unlike the foreign press, most Israelis are aware that Dagan’s animus against Netanyahu and Barak stems from the fact that he was fired from his post. That Diskin was passed over to replace Dagan may also explain his hard feelings. Moreover, the utter lack of public support for alternatives to Netanyahu or his policies makes the claim made in today’s New York Times that there is an “avalanche” of criticism about his stand on Iran farcical.