APN's daily news review from Israel

Monday April 15, 2019

 

Quote of the day:

"The people have decided that there are more important things than clean hands.."
--Former High Court justice Eliyahu Matza breaks his silence and speaks about the elections and the politicians.*

---

Front Page:

Haaretz

Yedioth Ahronoth

Maariv This Week (Hebrew links only)

Israel Hayom

News Summary:
Israeli President Reuven Rivlin begins today meeting the heads of the different parties to hear who they recommend be forming the next coalition government, but Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is expected to be the chosen one and is already hammering out his newest coalition - which he said would not be a unity government (Maariv), making today’s top story. Also in the news, an Israeli delegation canceled its visit to Bahrain citing security concerns, after a public outcry broke out with protesters taking to the streets of the capital.
 

Quick Hits:

---

Elections 2019 Commentary/Analysis:
Netanyahu May Have Won, but Israel's Political Landscape Has Fundamentally Changed (Anshel Pfeffer, Haaretz+) The disappearance of Labor and arrival of the largest centrist party in Israel’s history means that the next political battles will be fought on new issues: Not on peace or the Palestinians, but democracy.
This little piggy had none (Shimon Shiffer, Yedioth/Ynet) As Netanyahu heads toward his 5th term, repercussions of his divisive campaign remain. Likud brass should expect to be disappointed as the lucrative ministerial posts, finance, defense and foreign ministry, are expected to go to coalition partners. It is worthwhile that all parties commit to respect their political adversaries.
The Court Will Be Netanyahu's Punching Bag, With Nobody to Moderate the Blows (Revital Hovel, Haaretz+) Kulanu Chairman Moshe Kahlon says internal polling shows he lost voters because of his consistent defense of the legal system.
The real battle is within the Likud (Mati Tuchfeld, Israel Hayom) Although President Rivlin has yet to task Netanyahu with forming the next government, senior Likud officials are already battling over who will be made a minister.
Large-scale Intimidation Against Arabs on Election Day Shows Israeli Law Must Be Changed (Mordechai Kremnitzer, Haaretz+) A crime appears to have been committed here, and the motive was racist. The Knesset never imagined such a scenario.
While Kahol-Lavan blurred its positions, the right-wing went with its truth until victory (Ran Edelist, Maariv) It is hard to imagine that huge demonstrations of semi-violence against the corrupters of the draconian regime in Israel (will take place here), such as the outbursts in Venezuela or the Arab world/ Protest is born from real distress…A thousand postmortem surgeries won’t cover up the immortal fact: the tribes said their word. The rightist bloc won, and the State of Israel came a step closer to fulfilling Uri Avneri’s vision: integration into the Semitic space. The name of the winning game in the 2019 election was authenticity. The real winners were the tribes who went with their truth to the end, including "We are corrupt, so what?" They were the basis of the previous coalition and the one to be built later on. Headed by the Likud that went with its truth: No matter how corrupt Binyamin Netanyahu is, he is our leader and no one else. And it worked. In Yisrael Beiteinu, they went with their truth: It does not matter how corrupt the heads of the party are and that they are on their way to jail. We are focused on getting rid of the Arabs and killing every Palestinian who raises his head. And it worked. In Shas, too, they went with their truth: No matter how corrupt Aryeh Deri is, he is the leader of our traditional Mizrachism and the substitute of our Lord on earth. And it worked. United Torah Judaism went with its truth: What happens outside our shtetl does not interest us, the main thing is that we get our share of the pie. A corrupt prime minister? It must have happened while we were praying. And it worked. The Union of the Right-wing Parties also went with its truth: We are kosher Jews (not LGBTs), and warriors (not chiefs of staff, of course). Netanyahu's corruption? The immunity law will be enacted immediately. And it worked. Those who lost their authenticity on the right were actually Hayamin Hadash party of Naftali Bennett and Ayelet Shaked, who pretended to be lite-secular. I know a lot of people who are happy that they lost besides Bibi and Sara (Netanyahu), and I suggest that they calm down. If Shaked and Bennett would have tormented us with whips, Betzalel Samotrich and Yariv Levin will torture us with scorpions. In contrast to the right-wing religious-nationalist right which won, the clean Kahol-Lavan tried to do hybrid politics. It pretended to be right-wing, did religious rituals, winked to the left-wing and killed Arabs (in retrospect, as an entry ticket to the tribal society of the authentic right). I do not pretend to say that if Kahol-Lavan were playing it authentic left it would have been more successful. Benny Gantz & Co. did a pretty good show, but not good and real enough to sweep to victory. This is also the work of Avi Gabbay, who pretended to be Mizrahi, rightist, traditionalist, leftist, socialist, capitalist, and the more he dispersed in all the opposite directions, the more he lost himself and the votes of his voters. It is precisely the authenticity of Meretz and Hadash-Ta'al, both of which survived the electoral minimum threshold, which proves how equal it is when it comes from the core of the periphery and not from the ‘center.’
Across the Arab World, Women Are at the Forefront of the Revolution (Zvi Bar'el, Haaretz+) In Algeria, Yemen, Sudan and Egypt, women are at the helm of major change. But don't be fooled: Their rights still lay buried.
The "baboons" won: When the media mocked Netanyahu for years, it mocked his supporters (Kalman Liebeskind, Maariv) After years in which the media treated the prime minister as the leader of a herd, this great herd got up this week, and for the fifth time it raised a finger at it.
Unity Government? No, Thanks (Israel Cohen, Haaretz) While everyone else was busy with the submarines and Netanyahu’s catered meals, or with an Iranian hack of Benny Gantz’s cellphone, Arye Dery, Moshe Gafni and Yaakov Litzman were crisscrossing the country and amassing votes. Now, it’s payback time. The heads of the ultra-Orthodox parties will seek to reap the rewards and provide a long list of achievements for their voters, including a revised conscription law, requiring conversions to be performed according to Jewish law, preventing public transportation on Shabbat, and providing public housing and welfare allowances for families with many children. There’s no reason why Netanyahu, who knows who his loyal supporters are and even said so in every interview, should betray the trust they gave him and instead form a governing coalition with Gantz and Yair Lapid.
What's the point of national unity government? (Sever Plocker, Yedioth/Ynet)  Coalition government headed by Netanyahu with Gantz as his deputy not only undermines the interests of the politicians themselves but also doesn't serve the interests of the country, which - despite how it may seem - isn't facing any overwhelming crises.
Unity government - It All Comes Down to Lieberman (Raviv Drucker, Haaretz+) After the last election I was one of those who said: Let the right govern without excuses; let’s see them do it. They aren’t going to annex the territories and they won’t cancel the Oslo Accords. But while there was no annexation, it’s not certain that I was right. I was assuming that no government headed by Netanyahu would make progress on the diplomatic front, so there was no point in providing him with a fig leaf, as Barak did between 2009 and 2013 and Yair Lapid and Livni did in subsequent coalitions. I thought, how much damage could the right do? This time it’s different, because the potential damage that the right can do is real and significant. Perhaps even annexation, but certainly immunity for Netanyahu, a Supreme Court override clause, or a court that no longer has judicial review over legislation; an effort to castrate the Public Broadcasting Corporation and laws that will undermine the media in general.
There's no way forward for Israel's left without the Arabs (Uzi Baram, Haaretz+) Many will say a political alliance with the Arabs is a clear recipe for failure for the Jewish public. But this is exactly the goal of winning hearts and minds. I am not looking for understanding from Miri Regev and Bezalel Smotrich, but from the sort of people who want to bring down the corrupt kingdom that rules here. If the Arabs vote with similar turnout to that of the Jews, a revolution is possible.
To Boycott or Not to Boycott: Israel's Election as Seen From Ramallah (Amira Hass, Haaretz+) The debate among Palestinian citizens of Israel between participating in the election or boycotting it is not new, even if this year the participation rate continued a downward trend.

Commentary/Analysis:
Abbas is between a rock and a hard place (Yoni Ben Menachem, Israel Hayom) Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’ stubbornness is forcing the Palestinians to accept any new situation imposed upon them by the Trump administration and Israel.
Young Palestinians are digitally breaking Israel's Gaza blockade (Amira Hass, Haaretz+) The responses to the posts of the group of young people trying to speak out online about their desire to live freely are too hostile to be believable. Are they bots? Salaries employees of an Israeli ministry? Kahane supporters?
Abbas cannot take Israel to court (Eldad Beck, Israel Hayom) The Palestinians would be ill-advised to ignore Trump's threat of punishing those who try to prosecute Israel at the International Criminal Court.
Meet the World's Last, Best Hope to Prevent Israel's Annexation of the West Bank (Abe Silberstein and Daniel J. Solomon, Haaretz+) America's no longer pretending to be an honest broker. The Arab world's no longer pretending to care about the Palestinians. That leaves France's Macron holding the whole future of the Middle East peace process in his hands.
Trump’s clear view of the Golan Heights ( Clifford D. May, Israel Hayom) International law does not license aggressors to launch risk-free wars.
 
 

Prepared for APN by Orly Halpern, independent freelance journalist based in Jerusalem.