“AN INVIABLE
GOVERNMENT”
The consequences
of the last arm wrestling between Tel Aviv and the Palestinian resistance was
undoubtedly the cause of Netanyahu's departure from power in Tel Aviv, but will
it be for the better or for the worse?
By Yossi Tevi
It was the last order that sealed his political fate. Certain that he would continue to count on the customary impunity to exercise power without measures over the Palestinian population, Prime Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu with the advice of the head of the “Shin Bet” and his war cabinet ordered the bombing of the news offices that were located in the towers of "Al Jawhara" and "Al Shuruk" and the preparation for a land invasion to definitively end "Hamas" and consecrate a total and definitive occupation. No one objected to the first, but with regard to the invasion not everyone agreed since such an operation would imply a cost in human lives (especially their own) unpresentable for public opinion.
Likewise, "Bibi"
as a good autocrat -a term used Manicheanly by Biden's obsequious- was
confident and determined to win over the extreme right-wing sectors of the
Jewish population, who trusted that he would do whatever was necessary to comply
as he often commented with some of its officials "with the wishes of our
fathers who founded the state of Israel." Another objective was to distance
himself from his old colleague Naftali Bennett, another far-right and
practicing Jew who, turned into a contender with his “New Right” group, had
been positioning himself very well before the first incidents broke out in
Sheikh Jarrah.
This is how Netanyahu
decided to risk everything for everything, using as an excuse that the arrival
of his adversaries to power would endanger the stability and very existence of
the state. Bennett, a wealthy die-hard religious Zionist who not long ago
claimed that killing Arabs was of no consequence and that he aspires to take
over the West Bank makes many wonder how he is different from Netanyahu?
Apparently the differences, regardless of whether or not one is a "devotees",
pass through the view that each one has on their political role to contribute
to the Zionist cause and the means with which they will support the state of
Israel. But without a doubt that the leadership at the head of a messianic like
Naftali Bennett does not give rise to tranquility and, on the contrary, brings
very bad omens (many more than those they endured with Netanyahu) for the
Palestinians.
Likewise, the fighting
within Zionist political circles is fierce to such an extent that rumors
circulate that occult rituals of Pulse Denura (death curse) are resorted
to, which is nothing other than Jewish black magic. We must not lose sight of
the fact that this is a power struggle between the most extreme sectors of the
Israeli right -secular and religious- and this is not good news for
those who expect some sign of pacification. That is why Netanyahu knew where to
touch to raise the stakes and for this he had the resources provided by the
state and from his supremacist discourse, he promised to make them available to
the greatness of the Jewish people. Once again, "Bibi" appealed to
the discourse with messianic content that extremist Zionists both in Israel and
in the US are so pleased to hear, but undoubtedly with greater interest in dazzling
the latter who are the ones who contribute with their pressures and
contributions to the state funding.
When Hamas leader Islamil
Janiyeh denounced on television the fraud and arbitrariness that was being
perpetrated in Sheikh Jarrah and called on the Palestinians to revolt, he
undoubtedly struck a chord with the Tel Aviv bully who as usual and to give a
lesson. , ordered to cut the transmissions by bombing the facilities of
"Al Aqsa TV" that were in the complex of "Al Jawhara" and
"Al Shuruk" in central Gaza. This action not only cost the life of a
journalist but also that of several children from a family that lived in the
sector. At that moment "Bibi" must have thought "my supporters
are watching me and expect an iron determination from me" without being
interested in the least in the criminality that attacking journalists
represented, much less killing innocent civilians. Of course, these fanatical
Zionist sectors and with an increasingly important penetration in the Knesset,
celebrated this determination of this "prophet" of the Great Eretz
and welcomed and blessed the carnage they were about to cause.
The decision of the Israeli
court ordering the eviction of Sheikh Jarrah's Arab families to hand them over
to the Jewish settlers was the spark that set off everything. This type of
arbitrary decisions that Israel has imposed de facto on its occupants for
years, have been the daily bread and the demonstration of an international
legal anomie that has not been (or has not wanted to be) advocated by the
United Nations. This is another facet of the colonialist and expansionist plans
of a state that exercises the occupation of foreign territories without being
understood by the general laws. On this it is worth asking: Why do the
Palestinians not have the right to their own administration of justice? Do
courts of an occupying force have jurisdiction and competence over their
occupied? Is the exercise of these jurisdictional powers legitimate and legal
under these conditions?
But Bibi did not count on
the unison and general uprising of the Arab-Israelis from all the populations
that live in the interior towns. Although the uprisings in the West Bank were
massive and bloody, to counteract them the Israelis had the help of the
Palestinian police forces of the PNA, causing the deaths of 11 Palestinians and
costing old Mahmmoud Abbas the little respect he enjoys outside there. It was
the beginning of the end for Bibi.
Netanyahu and his supporters
realized that they had screwed up by trying to belittle the loyalty of
Arab-Israelis to their roots, which are a significant portion of the
population. To try to stay in power, Bibi needed to reach an agreement with Arab
parties, despite the abhorrence that this causes to the extremist sectors that
supported him. In Tel Aviv, the most pragmatic Zionists know that ending all
the Palestinians would not only be militarily and politically impossible, but
also economically intolerable since Israelis benefit from the workforce of
their occupied through the proportion of jobs that wealthy citizens do not
want. perform. Simply a lousy business.
Bibi's unpopularity had been
on the rise for months. His prosecutions along with his wife as customary con
artists were embarrassing a part of the Jewish community while others care
little if their political leader is a white-collar thief or a simple con man as
long as he maintains the security and prosperity of their economies. It was for
this reason that the settlers of the illegal settlements and in particular
those that border the Gaza Strip, blindly gave a vote of confidence to such an
ethically reprehensible prime minister. But on the outcome of your Apartheid
policies, was there any moral itch among Israelis for your government's actions
against the Palestinian population? Until what happened in Sheikh Jarrah and
the brutal bombings on Gaza, except for left-wing activists and independent
humanitarian NGOs, few were the ordinary Israelis who protested for this
reason, but it became part of the massive popular discontent that soon
developed. in street demonstrations with thousands of Israelis brandishing
Palestinian flags not only in Tel Aviv, Haifa or Jerusalem but also in London
and New York and in other EU countries calling for an end to the occupation.
To make matters worse, as
has been leaked from within Netanyahu's own cabinet, the effectiveness of the
anti-missile system "Iron Dome" has been much debated and the
conclusions about the bombings against Hamas military infrastructure yielded an
unjustifiable failure.
Netanyahu and his cabinet
ended up collapsing and today a new coalition arrived in their place,
undoubtedly much more dangerous and damaging to the integrity and rights of the
Palestinian population; in short, for regional peace. Given this, how viable is
a government of religious extremists for the subsistence of the state of
Israel?