Netanyahu at His Best

Reserve soldiers protesting a judicial overhaul (TOI)

Israel has been hurt. The bad publicity resulting from the massive protests over judicial reform legislation proposed by the current government has clearly done that. How much damage is hard to say. But there has been some damage to its reputation as a democracy. 

Whether Israel’s democracy would have suffered any real damage had the now postponed legislation been passed - depends on who you ask. But that is the message presented and accepted by those leaning to the left on both sides of the Atlantic.  The impression made by the opposition parties and their sympathetic media hostile to Netanyahu, is  that Israel's democracy is endangered. And that this is what all those good people in Israel were protesting.

The damage is real. As noted in the Times of Israel:

An Israeli security-focused think tank considered to be hawkish and to hold conservative views issued a rare warning on Sunday over the controversy surrounding the government’s judicial overhaul plans.

In a position paper titled “Israel should prepare for war — and politicians need to come to their senses,” the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security (JISS) said the overhaul effort has “caused enormous damage to the State of Israel.”

“The struggle over judicial reform has caused enormous damage to the State of Israel. On the political level, the image of American backing has been undermined (even if, in practice, the defense cooperation continues as usual),” said JISS. “On the economic level, the country’s credit rating has decreased. The public discourse in Israel reached new heights of acerbity and alienation. Above all, national cohesion was cracked, primarily due to the IDF being used as a tool in the political debate.

I don’t think any of this is arguable. The only question is, whose fault is it? That too depends on who you ask. But I think there is enough blame to go around that includes extremists on the political right, on the religious right, the secular left, and Netanyahu himself.

Be that as it may, I watched yet another masterful performance by the Israeli Prime Minister. It is the reason that I had always supported him. Yesterday, he was interviewed by a semi hostile Chuck Todd, the left leaning (and Jewish) moderator of NBC’s  Meet he Press.

As a spokesman for his nation, there are few that can do a better job than Netanyahu – even now in the midst of all this controversy No matter how much Todd tried to paint Netanyahu as undermining Israel’s democracy, destroying Israel's credit rating, catering to extremists in his government, or hurting Israel’s relationship the US , he was able to respond in ways that Todd could not challenge, without calling him a bald faced liar. 

To cynically retort that  Netanyahu is indeed a skilled liar with a glib tongue who cares not a whit about anyone but himself – and that you can’t believe a word that comes out of his mouth, is not the image I saw yesterday. I saw a man proud of his country defending it against many false accusations based on false information. 

I know that Netanyahu has lost a lot of support – even from members of his own party. And that his approval rating has dropped considerably to an all time low. But you would not know that from the way he responded to Todd. I saw a man proud of his country that believes in what he was doing was in the best interests of the country. Clarifying and correcting misconceptions.  

To cite a few examples. the common belief that His reform package was self serving in the sense that it would somehow stop his corruption trial was absolutlely false, too. All judges currently adjudicating trials in Israeli courts (including his own corruption trial) would be left as is. The charges would remain in place and the trial would proceed to verdict on the basis of the evidence presented.  

The common belief  that the law would be changed to allow convicted felons from serving in government was also false. It was only allow indicted people to serve to serve before any verdict is reahced.  Which is really just the extension of the principle: Innocent until proven guilty

He also clearly stated that he is seeking broad consensus from both sides of the political aisle with respect to judicial reform. A reform that would strip thepreme court of its unfettered control over all Knesset legislation but (and this is key) NOT to give it all to the Knesset. He is seeking balance that would assure both the rights of the majority while protecting the rights of the minority. The exact same thing I said should be done.

I know that none of this will convince those who believe that Netanyahu is pure slime. (And there are a lot of you!) I am sure you believe Netanyahu was lying through his teeth during this interview. But I do not believe that is the case. It would be to easy to prove he lied if things do not work out the way he clearly and unambiguously said they would.

Whatever the case may be, I still think there is no better spokesman for his country than Netanyahu is for Israel. It's just too bad that things have deteriorated this far. I for one do not think that the right wing extremists in his government have as much control over policy as many think they do. 

Who knows. If Netanyahu was anywhere near telling the truth, then maybe things will change for the better. .And everyone will gain.