In Israel, politicians like Yair Golan gain popularity when they call for genocide

Yair Golan is a well-known general in Israel. He was previously the army’s Deputy Chief of Staff and has occupied a leading position in the left-Zionist Meretz party. Golan has long tried to combine militarism with an ostensible peacenik attitude usually attributed to the left, but it seems his efforts were in vain when he came out in fifth place in the 2022 elections when Meretz failed to make it beyond the electoral threshold. 

Come October 7, however, Golan made a heroic comeback. He went directly into the battle — borrowing his son’s paratrooper boots, donning his officer’s uniform, arming himself with a gun, and proceeding to carry out various one-man rescue operations using his private car in the “Gaza envelope,” specifically in the areas that suffered most from the Hamas-led attack. These actions buy a person lots of legitimacy in Israel’s militant culture. What does a person like that use it for? Advocating for genocide. 

In an interview with Raanan Shaked published on October 13 in the centrist Ynet, Golan was asked about what immediate action he was calling for in response to October 7. Golan’s response does not mince words:

“First of all, close all the electricity switches to Gaza. I think that in this battle, it is forbidden to allow a humanitarian effort. We need to say to them: listen, until the [captives] are released, from our side, you can die from starvation. It’s totally legitimate.” 

Well, one need not be an expert in international law to know that, far from being “legitimate,” this kind of genocidal collective punishment is, prima facie, a crime against humanity. 

Golan is, of course, no outlier in Israeli politics, echoing Defense Minister Yoav Gallant’s infamous statement that Gaza would receive “no power, no food, no gas” because Israel is “fighting human animals, and will act accordingly.” 

But wait, Golan is a liberal, so he must hedge his statement to give an air of “level-headedness.” 

Shaked asks him: “You hear people saying ‘erase Gaza.’”

To which Golan replies:

“I don’t think they really know what it means. In Gaza, there are 2.1 million people [the real number is likely closer to 2.3 million]. To kill them all? In my eyes, this is an unprofessional statement by unprofessional people. It has a tint of revenge, which I can understand the emotional root of, but war is not done by revenge. And also revenge is best served cold — from the head, not from the heart.”

In other words, wholesale genocide is simply “unprofessional” when carried out by the wrong people — not necessarily bad, just inadvisable, and preferably “served cold.” Professional revenge, however, is entirely “legitimate.”

Vying for PM position

A Haaretz article on December 7 covers Golan’s campaigns for becoming a future leader, addressing the possibility of him drawing in centrists like Tzipi Livni to compete with Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid party:

“Golan’s drawing [of] power is reflected in recent surveys. A Labor-Meretz union under his leadership is worth eight Knesset seats at the moment, but that is not necessarily his ceiling.” 

Golan is doing mock speeches of Netanyahu in his appearances in the south, where he is very popular, saying what he thinks Netanyahu should be saying but isn’t:

“‘Have no fear,'” Golan mimes, “‘the IDF will know how to remove every threat of penetration of the communities, and I assure you faithfully that a permanent military presence will remain in every community along the northern border. I call on you to return home. The return will be done in stages according to a blueprint that I will present.'”

In conclusion, Golan says, “That is what Netanyahu should have said if he weren’t so abject and pathetic. If he were capable of standing before the nation and speaking the truth.”

Seeking a return to politics

Golan was passed over for promotion to army Chief of Staff, likely due to a statement he made in 2016 when he warned against “finding remnants” of 1920s-40s Germany in Israel today. He then tried to get into politics in 2019, attempting to reactivate a defunct left-Zionist party, Democratic Choice, and eventually joining Ehud Barak, a similarly militarist “leftist” hypocrite, who established a new party at the time that came to be called Democratic Union. That party included Meretz and Gesher, but failed to make it in the 2020 elections. Golan then went for Meretz, which has since been effectively decimated in the rightward shift of Israeli society — well before October 7. Indeed, this shift is evident in Golan’s own statements about his politics, maintaining that although he is on the left of the political spectrum, he is “not a leftist.”

Yet after the tanking of his political career, Golan has found in October 7 an opportunity to reinvent himself, enacting his feats of “heroism” to rehabilitate his image.

“It sounds like you are returning to politics,” Shaked tells him in the Ynet interview. 

“Sure,” Golan replies. “An event like this, who will take responsibility? Who will rehabilitate the state of Israel, [Likud lawmaker] Tali Gottlieb? Benjamin Netanyahu? I’ll tell you who will rehabilitate the state of Israel: the good hearted and honest people, the people who have dedicated their lives and will continue to dedicate them.” 

“Do you think that this event has changed something in how the public relates to you?” Shaked asks.

“I have never been depressed from people calling me ‘traitor’ and ‘radical left’ and I am also not enthused by people saying ‘we were wrong about him,’” Golan answers. He goes on to say that he is there to “fight for the only thing that can save the state of Israel: a brave connection to the heritage, to history, to the past, to the folklore that makes us a people, and on the other hand clinging to humanity — a state that would be the best for its citizens, all of its citizens.” 

Except for Palestinians, to whom the designation of “humanity” does not seem to apply. They don’t even get to be second-class citizens under the apartheid regime extending from the river to the sea. They can just “die from starvation.”