The Most Dangerous Scammer is The “Honest” One
Zehoot (I’m using a phonetic transliteration rather than the official “Zehut”), which means Identity in Hebrew, prides itself upon bringing a fresh new clean politics to Israel. This in itself is an outrageous conceit; see my previous Circus Act Diary.
Why? because this exact claim has been the most common schtick of new protest parties in Israel since the 1970s. There were sooo many of these, and way too many succeeded in duping too many voters. They all ended up crashing and burning, or vanishing into thin air — and the more brazen the claims of having the magic recipe that will clean Israel up, the more spectacular the crashing/vanishing act.
But none have made claims quite as brazen, far-reaching, and totally lacking in perspective and self-awareness, as Zehoot.
“No, But Zehoot is Different. Here, You Can Read Its Platform...”
Indeed, they have a very detailed Hebrew platform, and an abridged English translation that doesn’t seem to shy away from the crazy stuff. You can ask for a copy on this link, and it gets emailed to you immediately. They obtain your email address this way (of course they followed up with a spam email within minutes ;).
Zehoot’s “Diplomatic Program” describing their approach to the conflict with the Palestinians, appears near the platform’s very end. Not the height of transparency, if you ask me. Especially when the Hebrew platform is 200 pages long. Anyway, we scroll to p. 173 (and p.39 of the English summary), skim through some semi-coherent rants against the Oslo process (easy target, no one in Israel is a fan anymore) - and reach the Diplomatic Program, copied word for word except for one grammatical correction (emphasis mine, I couldn’t help myself):
The program’s basic assumptions are:
- The Land of Israel belongs to the people of Israel alone by Divine choice.
- International law recognizes that the territory of Judea and Samaria is designated for a Jewish state, as Justice Levy’s report showed.
- The demographic trend is in favor of the Jews, and by 2035 a majority of 80%
of Jews are expected to live in Israel, from the Mediterranean to the Jordan River.
- Most Arab residents of Judea and Samaria want to emigrate and many already do so.
What a cocktail! Divine choice, but just in case we also have international law, demographics, *and* unique insight into Palestinian society on our side. Not to mention common sense, as many I’m-not-rightwinger-myself-but-my-new-middle-name-is-Zehoot types will tell you.
As you might suspect, the latter three bullet points rely upon typical alt-right crackpottery. For example, Justice Levy was arguably the furthest-right in High Court history; to give one example, he alone voted to rule the evacuation of settlements and soldiers from Gaza in 2005 as unconstitutional. Bibi requested from Levy the report in question after he retired, knowing exactly what the result will be.
But let us continue.
The Stages of the Program
Stage One: The Oslo Accords will be canceled and the legal situation restored to its pre-Oslo status.
Second stage: The terrorists will be offered a peaceful withdrawal, similar to the PLO withdrawal from Lebanon in 1982.
Third stage: The IDF will take over the territory as it was able to do in Operation Defensive Shield, and the State of Israel will apply its full sovereignty over all parts of the country. No element except for the IDF, the Israel Police and authorized civilians (see above) will carry arms.
Stage Four: Non-Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria will be offered three options:
- Assistance in immigration: The state will enable interested residents to sell their property, and will help them emigrate to the destination of their choice.
- Residency: Those who wish to remain and declare their allegiance openly will receive the status of permanent residents in the Jewish state. All their human and property rights shall be preserved in the same manner as permanent residents of other Western countries (as the United States does with the inhabitants of Samoa, the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico, and Britain with the Cypriots remaining under its control).
- Citizenship: Those who wish to be loyal citizens and serve in the army (such as the Druze, for example) will be able to receive full citizenship after a long and thorough examination track.
Nice and easy, right?
The English version is a bit cryptic about who are “Terrorists” . By the way, the plan as it reads in Hebrew, mandates re-asserting full control over Gaza as well not only the West Bank, something that the English version is again a bit foggy on.
Here are some nuggets I translated from the Hebrew version (again emphasis mine):
Principles
Land of Israel — This is Our Land
Greater Israel is solely the land of the Jewish People
due to our devotion to it across the Ages, as a nation and as individuals
On the foundation of the decision of The Creator, G-D of Israel
[and not due to a UN decision, as it lamentably says in Israel’s declaration of independence]…
Who by His Will, granted it to us
[as says Rashi, in the opening to his classic Torah interpretations]…
...Israel will offer to anyone in Judea, Samaria and Gaza who wishes to continue fighting against it, or to continue bearing Palestinian arms, or is unwilling to live under Israeli control — a respectable retreat with their personal light weapons and their families…
...after this mutually agreed retreat, anyone in Judea, Samaria and Gaza who still fights, or incites to violence, or engages in any other forbidden activity, or still carries arms without Israeli authorization — will be considered an enemy.
Meanwhile, IDF, the secret police, and all other relevant security and government bodies will complete their preparations for complete takeover of all parts of Judea, Samaria and Gaza not yet under our control.
Feiglin devotes particular attention to Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, the location of the Al-Aqsa mosque and Dome of the Rock (pictured), and where various generations of Jewish Temples stood at times until 70 AD:
Zehut will strive to transfer the government complex, the Knesset building and the Supreme Court from the west of the city to the Old City in the areas adjacent to the Temple Mount.
...By virtue of the Law for the Preservation of the Holy Places, Zehut intends to hand over the Temple Mount to the Chief Rabbinate, which will also be able to regulate the ascent and prayer of the Jews on the Mount to the permissible areas within the framework of Jewish law and demarcate those areas. A Jewish synagogue will be built on the Mount. In addition, the Temple Mount will be opened for archeological research without the current restrictions.
The program generously “allows” Muslims to continue praying at Al-Aqsa (of course, everything subject to the Chief Rabbinate and the police) — but between the lines one understands that Dome of the Rock may become off limits to them, and is probably where the new synagogue will be built.
This places Zehoot at the very extremist far-right fringe of Israeli politics. I’m not sure even the Kahanists exhibit such fetish towards Temple Mount.
There’s more and more, but I’m getting a bit nauseous. Let me just end this part with this aspect of Israeli diplomacy, straight from the English version:
Israel’s Foreign Policy
The State of Israel must be a moral role model for the rest of the nations. According to this view, Israel will continue to develop many ties with foreign countries but will not compromise on moral principles. For example, the State of Israel will stop selling arms and military knowledge to regimes that commit crimes against humanity and violate human rights.
Are You Having Fun Yet?
In many ways, all the above was expected of Moshe Feiglin, who burst into public life in the mid-1990s as a 30-something settler who spearheaded an endless series wild demonstrations against the Oslo process, specializing in blocking of highways and junctions, all under the brand name “Zo Artzenu!” (“This is OUR Land!”). He then spent the 2000s repeatedly and quixotically challenging Bibi to Likud’s leadership, and trying to set up what most of Likud’s rank and file saw as a messianic alt-right Trojan horse inside the party. He even crashed once into parliament via the Likud List.
But in a general election, the electoral market segment for Feiglin’s messianic merchandise is very narrow, and competition is fierce. His current surge in mainstream appeal comes from a newfound love for completely unrelated (not to say: contradictory) domestic policies, which occupy the top 80% of Zehoot’s platform. Here’s a smattering.
The document in your hands is much more than a party platform. It is a Jewish vision and a message of national liberty of historic proportions.
To perfect the world in the Kingdom of the Almighty,
Moshe Feiglin
…
Education: Zehut proposes the voucher method, practiced in several places around the world: a system that combines public funding and free competition, and most importantly, restores the responsibility for education to parents….Adoption of the voucher system (parallel to the current system) will create a variety of independent schools that will compete for the parents’ vouchers, thus offering a curriculum adapted to the wishes of the parents and not to the will of the bureaucratic system.
…
Family: cancellation of the Tender Years Clause [which gives mothers custody advantage for children under 6 — AO]….
In addition, ...Currently, the State Prosecutor’s Office and the police refrain from criminal investigation and prosecution in cases of false complaints. Zehut will formulate procedures according to which a well-founded suspicion of a false complaint will constitute grounds for opening a criminal investigation.
Social Security: Gradual reduction of the state’s insurance services (loss of work-fitness insurance, long-term care insurance and disability insurance) and their transfer to the free market…. Those people entitled to pensions will continue to receive them. [but eventually Israel’s Social Security Administration will be liquidated completely — AO]
Healthcare:
- Hospitals will be privatized in the process of open tender. The health funds and the government will not be allowed to own hospitals.
- ...Each private hospital will be allowed to engage in medical tourism and conduct private surgeries…
- ...Every health entrepreneur will be granted the right to set up a hotel and a commercial center next to the hospital under one license…
Economy: Zehut proposes the flat tax system: a uniform rate tax that applies to all types of income – without tax brackets… Zehut will reduce corporate tax…
Zehut will prohibit the granting of benefits, concessions and grants by the state… will close the governmental bodies whose role is to assist entrepreneurship or encourage the industry, and allow the private market to play its role.
And on and on. This is very much a dude’s party. Their top woman (at #4), is a “Men’s Rights” activist who wrote that section of the platform. I kid you not. And I left out many gems, like erasing any government support for any of the arts.
Libertarianism is a ridiculous ideology to begin with. But a theocratic, messianic, supremacist libertarianism? G-D help us.
And yet, despite the far-right kookiness on all fronts, laced liberally with outright Orthodox messianism, Zehoot is the hottest merchandise among young voters. Here:
Zehoot has become right-wing students’ first choice, but it definitely enjoys quite a bit of support from many non-right-wing youngsters. What is its strongest selling point with this constituency, as well as with many apathetic and jaded Gen-X’ers?
Yes, cannabis is enough of a fig-leaf to cover the worst and most dangerous policies in the eyes of thousands and thousands of low-information voters.
After starting the campaign looking almost like a joke party, poll after poll started seeing Zehoot clear the formidable 3.25% threshold. By the end of polling 4 days ago, they were clearing every poll relatively comfortably with 5-6 seats. And Israeli electoral history suggests that trendy, protest parties favored by the young tend to outperform their poll predictions.
Interestingly, despite being the farthest-right party in contention, Zehoot (unlike the rest of the right wing) has not committed itself to ally with Bibi. As hinted in the diary’s open, Feiglin and Bibi loathe each other. By contrast, Likud’s supposedly moderate rivals Blue-White headed by Ganz, have already indicated that they are open to doing business with the madman (but they are ruling out any alliance with Palestinian-Israeli parties, of course).
In short, both Bibi and Ganz might find themselves after tonight, unable to get to 60 seats without Feiglin, and having precious few other paths to majority. The craziest and most dangerous man in Israeli politics nowadays will also become its kingmaker.
Polls have closed and the first batch of exit polls are out: all 3 networks forecast Zehoot did not make it past the 3.25% threshold. This is a staggering setback, and one that — if it holds, those polls are known to drift as real results flow in (since the exit polls end 2 hours before voting ends) — if it holds, I’m pretty sure this setback will generate endless conspiracy theories among the party’s die-hards.