And they include people across the political spectrum.
And they include people across the political spectrum.
O nce touting itself as a model for tackling the coronavirus, Israel is now experiencing a massive surge in new infections and widespread disappointment over the government’s handling of the ensuing economic collapse. At least 10,000 protesters on Saturday night packed into Paris Square in Jerusalem, next to the residence of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, while an unclear number of protesters arrived at major highway intersections to protest the government’s economic response to the pandemic. Unfortunately for Netanyahu and his allies, as much as they would like to paint these protests as entirely the product of the radical Left, they indicate much wider discontent.
Israel imposed one of the strictest lockdowns in the world at the height of the pandemic’s arrival in Europe, causing newly reported coronavirus cases to flatline by May. However, Israeli health experts and even Netanyahu himself acknowledge that the country reopened too soon. Israel also failed to develop a plan to build up the contact-tracing infrastructure necessary to nip outbreaks in the bud without closing large sectors of the economy. Naftali Bennett, a right-wing rival of Netanyahu’s, called in April for the IDF to handle contact tracing, because of the army’s massive size and organizational capabilities. However, Netanyahu, loath to hand a right-wing competitor credit for tackling the coronavirus, kept contact-tracing responsibilities with other agencies. Detractors believe that Netanyahu became too distracted by other issues, including the Trump peace plan and a looming budget fight in the Knesset, to focus on the pandemic. The surge in coronavirus cases grew to about 2,000 per day by late July, even as some in Netanyahu’s ruling party were hinting at the possibility of new elections and were preemptively blaming rivals for causing what would be the fourth round of voting in less than two years.
Meanwhile, over 20 percent of Israelis are unemployed or temporarily furloughed because of the pandemic. Israel’s large tourism industry is devastated; restaurateurs have threatened to remain open even if the government imposes a new lockdown; and the general despair of being in lockdown has affected the country much like it has other nations.
There is always a small cadre of Israelis eager to protest against Netanyahu over the prime minister’s alleged corruption. But the economic dislocation has now motivated scores of people to protest against him, not just over corruption but over what they see as the government’s mismanagement of the crisis. Protests against Netanyahu have reached this size in the past following developments in the corruption cases against him; now, however, the anti-Netanyahu activists seem to have been joined by citizens with various other grievances.
It must be said that Netanyahu has not exactly helped his own image: In mid-June, Netanyahu had lawmakers debate and eventually pass a motion to give the prime minister 1 million shekels (about $270,000) in retroactive tax rebates. The prime minister later wrote on Twitter that the “timing was not right” for passing the motion, but that he was justified in obtaining those rebates.
The protests have so far been leaderless. They include not only a radical contingent of activists bent on ousting Netanyahu but also people on the center-left (and even a few on the right) driven to desperation by economic circumstances. The Israeli media have highlighted striking moments, including a police officer’s kneeling on a protester’s neck, echoing the scene of George Floyd’s death in the U.S., and a woman’s taking off her shirt while protesting on top of a statue of a menorah.
Several of my own friends, musicians with whom I played in orchestras and other ensembles while I was working as a violist in Israel, have participated in protests in Jerusalem and elsewhere. These friends have been essentially stuck at home for the past five months, taking unemployment, with barely any opportunity to make a living aside from teaching via Zoom. This, combined with what they experienced as the Israeli government’s chaotic handling of the economic crisis, drove them to protest despite fears that they would catch the coronavirus from other demonstrators. (As a part of the demonstrations, one friend, a conductor, led a reunion of IDF military-band members, while two violinists I know participated in a performance of Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony on a street in Jerusalem.)
The combination of different political elements among the protesters has complicated journalists’ efforts to make sense of the events. Some left-wing commentators see the demonstrations as a cry for help from the citizens of Israel, while right-wing media personalities tend to point toward the more radical, Portland-style demonstrators as evidence that protesters’ aims are not wholly justified. Regardless, people from the far left and the center are participating in the demonstrations.
What’s missing from the demonstrations is a sizeable presence of right-wingers, as well as religious Israelis. These groups have not joined the protests in part because they do not want to be associated with radical anti-Netanyahu activists, not to mention that they fear getting COVID-19. As one journalist for the right-religious outlet Makor Rishon wrote on Facebook, “democracy” means “to respect the results of elections, and not to try to topple the prime minister with the methods of Anarchy and the Bastille.” But this is cold comfort for Netanyahu because even these sections of the Israeli population are disappointed with him. Recent polls have shown that if elections were held now, Netanyahu’s Likud Party would lose seats in the Knesset. Those seats would be picked up by Naftali Bennett, whose contact-tracing strategy Netanyahu initially refused to adopt. Meanwhile, an Israel Democracy Institute survey released on Wednesday found that 53 percent of right-wing respondents said they “identified with” the protests over the government’s current economic policy.
Netanyahu and his allies may continue to blame the intensified “anti-Bibi” protests on the machinations of the radical Left. But in truth, the discontent is widespread and on both sides of the political aisle. Netanyahu has been through tough periods, however, and he has managed to retain power despite numerous challenges to his rule over the past ten years. He recently appointed a new point man, Roni Gamzu, to lead Israel’s coronavirus response. Gamzu, the head of the Ichilov Hospital in Tel Aviv, has promised Israelis an end to “illogical” restrictions on gatherings, and he said that the “socioeconomic trauma” of the pandemic is “much greater” than its health consequences. If Gamzu’s plan is effective and the Netanyahu government implements it efficiently — and businesses are allowed to open up again — the protests might die down, leaving only the most die-hard anti-Bibi activists to keep up their fight.