Here is an interminable piece at Haaretz about the revival of “leftwing Zionism”– which the authors make clear does not include “energetic marginal elements such as Sheikh Jarrah Solidarity, Anarchists Against the Wall and other groups.” I.e., the only groups actually interested in ending Jim Crow. It’s a strange piece because it is so inside the bubble of Israeli politics. Imagine strategizing about leftwing American politics if blacks weren’t included in the coalitions? Polling all the governed in any Israeli political system would instantly change the political values.
Thus the bizarre logic of the piece: that some leftwingers over the last decade supported Netanyahu and Lieberman. I’m sorry, you can’t be a leftist and support Lieberman. But the authors rationalize it:
The other half of [Israel’s leftwing camp post the crash of the Camp David negotiations] pursued a different tactic after September 2000: In essence, it appointed itself to be in charge of the PR branch of Likud, the National Union and the Yesha council of settlements, the three major political groups responsible for the crash-and-burn situation of the country’s dovish camp. These left-wing people said: Only the right wing will make peace, only Benjamin Netanyahu should be prime minister, Avigdor Lieberman is a pragmatist – and, in short: “It’s good to have Likud in power.”
The most concise summary of this state of affairs was provided by [Gary] Wexler, the Californian, with lucid simplicity: “The right,” he said, “played a fast one on you.”
According to Wexler’s analysis, in the past decade a quiet political campaign was conducted here with the aim of persuading the left that it was “powerless” and that “only the right wing can do it.”
Wexler is a California adman and presumably a liberal Zionist. Maybe he should explain to Israelis what freedoms minorities enjoy in the U.S.– suffrage, for one thing.
This is a great point that Gershom Gorenberg made at J Street recently: you have settlements in the Occupied Territories where hundreds of thousands of Israelis vote in Israel elections. Because that’s their government, right? And their neighbors, the Palestinians, can’t vote in those elections. Though that government is determining their future too. Crazy.
