Sarkozy called Israeli PM Netanyahu 'liar'

geeimsobored · Nov 13, 2011

Deji said: ↑

It's an unholy (pun intended) alliance of ultra-Orthodox, religious settlers, and the nationalist right (who are also settlers and supporters of settlers), all of which alone are marginal, but in any coalition, hold a lot of sway. For a center-right and more-or-less secular party like Likud they need these guys to hold power.

The Ultra-Orthodox live in very isolated communities, generally NOT the settlements and generally don't work and expect the taxpayer to support their poverty-laden lifestyle of studying religious texts and NOT joining the army. The TRUE Ultra-Orthodox want little to do with the state of Israel itself (and largely do NOT celebrate non-religious holidays like Independence Day or Veterans Day), and as a voting bloc go with whomever will give them the most taxpayer money.

The ultra-Orthodox have almost always been in a coalition, dating back to the very socialist governments at the founding of the state, which is why even under staunch atheists like David Ben-Gurion, offices like the Chief Rabbinate and the domain of control of religious conversions and other religious matters have always been given up to include their participation.

Lately they've been emboldened by the political Judaisation of Israel being done by the settlers (who often aren't that religious - but are all very ethnocentric and nationalistic). So in places like Jerusalem, ads depicting women are defaced, rocks thrown at cars of Shabbat, and people unwilling to rent apartments to people who aren't kosher and shabbat-observant Jews is becoming more commonplace.

The nationalist-settler wing, on the other hand are stepping up attacks on Arabs, arson on Arab-owned businesses, building illegal outposts in the West Bank, provoking the Palestinians that live there, and not least, defacing Christian and Muslim Cemeteries with graffiti. They also demonize NGOs and anyone that questions them, the Occupation, or any war the country gets into. And when I say demonize, I mean draft laws that limit free speech. Examples include, making it illegal to express the Palestinian narrative of 1948 (Statehood for Israel - but the Nakba (tragedy) for them), outlawing foreign NGO's and NGO's with foreign funding (though suspiciously organizations like AIPAC are not on the list, and orgs like Amnesty International are).

This group DOES work and does do army service, and in the last decade or so has been much more politically active and push their flock to join combat units and change the character of the army to be more religious and nationalistic. The army traditionally is associated with the secular left, and that is changing as more and more of these troops are refusing to be in an audience when women sing in army-sponsored events, break orders and pass on information to settlement leaders when the army is going to evacuate illegal outposts, and so on.

So in short, yes, the Ultra-Orthodox are a problem, but they are a subset of a much bigger problem. They would still have some power and some say even in a Left-wing government, but in the current coalition (very much to the RIGHT of Netanyahu) they are exercising their power. The biggest of all is the Ministry of the Interior (a Shas MK is the minister), which is in charge of immigration. Immigrants, foreign workers, asylum seekers and others not deemed sufficiently Jewish enough are not made to feel very welcome, and on many occasions, have been deported.

Kadima won the last election and couldn't build a large enough coalition...so the #2 party got a chance to do it. Likud sided with the ultra-right and managed to build one. The rest is history.
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So any hope on the horizon? (and/or solutions)

Mathloom · Nov 13, 2011

da_juice said: ↑

I read an op-ed in Foreign Affairs, the author was saying that the Ultra-Orthodox have become the key demographic in federal elections in Israel, and that as such politicans try to cater to them (giving them funding to study religious text, having a stricter interpretation of what it means to be the "Jewish State", backing support for an Israel with Biblical borders) it's interesting if true, especially because he also claimed that this is alienating the secular and intellectuals, causing them to emigrate and only further aggravating the situation.

I'm not too familar with Israeli politics or Israeli soceity in general, can someone who perhaps is a bit more familar verify what the author said?
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I don't have any experience, but I do recall reading some articles on Haaretz by the people you're referring to about the situation you're referring to. I'll try to find them.

da_juice · Nov 14, 2011

Just in case you're interested, I found the op-ed I read.

http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/136593/ronald-r-krebs/israels-bunker-mentality

HorryForThree · Nov 14, 2011

Interesting take in haaretz:

haaretz said:

Why should anyone believe Netanyahu?

How many politicians, media people and ordinary citizens believe Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is sincerely interested in reaching a peace agreement with the Palestinians?

By Akiva Eldar

If the law enabled putting leaders on trial for serial defrauding of the public and obtaining support through deception, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would be keeping company with Moshe Katsav in prison. The former president has been convicted of raping women who were his subordinates and misuse of his authority. Netanyahu is having his nefarious way with Israeli democracy and using his status in order to lead Israeli society astray, all the way to diplomatic and economic isolation. From there it is but a short way to regional war and apartheid - the only question is which will come first. Yet nevertheless, a whole country is continuing to give in willingly to a liar who does not cease to harass and endanger it.

Have I exaggerated? How many politicians, media people and ordinary citizens believe Netanyahu is sincerely interested in reaching a peace agreement with the Palestinians? The reference, of course, is not to an agreement that will include Israeli control over the Jordan Valley for 40 years, as Netanyahu proposed recently to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

During the course of a condolence visit to one of the Jewish settlements at the end of the 1990s, Netanyahu bragged that he had succeeded in deceiving the Clinton administration during his first term as prime minister, in order to destroy the Oslo Accords. Believing the microphones and cameras had been turned off, Netanyahu related how he had extorted from the Clinton administration, in exchange for the Hebron agreement, a promise that Israel would be the sole entity entitled to define what the "military sites" are that will remain under its control. With a sly smile spread across his face, Bibi added: "I said that as far as I am concerned the entire Jordan Valley is a defined military site," and explained: "Why is this important? Because from that moment I stopped the Oslo Accords."

Yitzhak Shamir, Netanyahu's predecessor in the Likud leadership, put this in simple words: "For the Land of Israel it is permissible to lie." Netanyahu, a student of conservative American media advisor Arthur Finkelstein, has a more sophisticated formulation. In a lecture at a Likud conference in Eilat in July 2001, Bibi instructed the activists: "It doesn't matter if justice is on your side. You have to depict your position as just."

Eventually he gave this procedure the broadest possible interpretation. Though in all likelihood he had not forgotten when he came into this world (October 21, 1949 ), he was able to recount a formative encounter with British soldiers near his childhood home, even though the Mandate had ended well before his birth.

The things French President Nicolas Sarkozy told United States President Barack Obama sum up the reputation he has acquired abroad. The microphone that had been left open by mistake pulled away the diplomatic mask and revealed the two important leaders' opinion of the prime minister of Israel. This was preceded by a meeting between Sarkozy and President Shimon Peres at the beginning of 2010 at the Elysee Palace, during the course of which the French president said: "I don't understand where Netanyahu is going and what he wants."

An equally important European leader, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, also joined the club of people affected by Netanyahu's lies. Her opinion of the prime minister's peace declarations did not make its way to the microphones, but according to a report by Barak Ravid in Haaretz in February, Merkel told Netanyahu in a phone conversation: "You have disappointed us. You have not taken a single step to advance peace."

On the eve of the most recent meeting between Netanyahu and Obama in New York, it was leaked to The New York Times that Obama had told his advisors he didn't believe Netanyahu would ever be prepared to carry out compromises leading to a peace agreement. Prior to that Steven Simon, Senior Director for Middle East and North Africa at the White House, revealed in a conference call with Jewish community leaders in the United States that the Palestinians had agreed to renew the negotiations on the basis of Obama's outline (the 1967 lines and agreed exchanges of territories ) and that the ball was now in Netanyahu's court.

As is known, Bibi depicts President Abbas as refusing to enter negotiations. With a trove of lies like this, is Bibi expecting "the world" to believe he intends to attack Iran's nuclear installations and tighten the sanctions on Iran? Why shouldn't they suspect that maybe all the ruckus about the bomb is intended only to distance the threat of peace, and therefore not lift a finger against the Iranian threat?
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Sarkozy called Israeli PM Netanyahu 'liar'

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