November 26, 2018: Is a sea change imminent in Israeli politics?

By Michael Regenstreif

As I write this column – on November 16 – Israel’s coalition government headed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, leader of the Likud party, appears to be on the verge of collapse.

The latest crisis for the coalition began on November 14 when defence minister Avigdor Liberman, leader of the Yisrael Beiteinu party, resigned his post in protest over the cabinet’s decision to accept a ceasefire with the terrorist groups in the Gaza Strip after a round of fighting that saw close to 500 rockets fired at southern Israel in a 25-hour period.

The fighting saw one Israeli military officer – identified only as Lt.-Col. M. – killed during an Israel Defense Forces raid into Gaza. Ironically, the only civilian killed in Israel was Mahmoud Abu Asbah, a Palestinian from the West Bank who was in Ashkelon with a permit to work in Israel. However, there was significant damage and numerous injuries – some of them serious – to Israelis from the rockets.

Many residents in Israel’s south objected to the ceasefire, but Netanyahu defended it.

“At these moments, leadership is not to do the easy thing; leadership is to do the right thing, even if it is difficult. Leadership is sometimes facing criticism when you know confidential and sensitive information that you cannot share with the citizens of Israel, and in this case with the residents of the south, whom I love and appreciate greatly,” said the prime minister, who assumed the role of defence minister himself.

Netanyahu also serves as Israel’s foreign minister – so one person now holds a monopoly on three of the most important and demanding positions in Israel’s government.

Liberman was one of four cabinet ministers who opposed the ceasefire. The others were Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked of the Jewish Home party, Education Minister Naftali Bennett, leader of Jewish Home, and Environmental Protection Minister Zeev Elkin of Likud.

As he resigned from cabinet, Liberman pulled Yisrael Beiteinu’s five Knesset members from the coalition leaving Netanyahu with a slim 61-seat majority.

After the resignation, Bennett demanded he be appointed defence minister and reportedly threatened to pull Jewish Home’s eight Knesset seats from the coalition if the demand was not met. That would leave the coalition in minority status with just 53 seats.

As I write, I’ve just seen reports that Netanyahu concluded a meeting with Bennett and rejected his demand for the defence ministry.

While that would seem to set the stage for a collapse of the coalition, Netanyahu’s office released a statement saying he “has confidence in the sense of responsibility of cabinet ministers not to make the historic error of toppling a right-wing government.”

But that remains to be seen. Israeli coalitions are usually fractious and often fall before the end of a four-year mandate. Even before the Netanyahu-Bennett meeting, Justice Minister Shaked, also of Jewish Home, said, “This week will decide whether we’re headed to elections or whether the cabinet will continue until November 2019,” presumably in reference to Bennett’s demand for the defence portfolio.

There are also reports that Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon, leader of the Kulanu party which holds 10 seats, and Interior Minister Aryeh Deri, leader of the Shas party which holds seven seats, are calling for new elections – although neither, at least so far, has threatened to quit the coalition.

So, as I mentioned in my opening paragraph, Netanyahu’s coalition appears to be on the verge of collapse. By the time you read this column, we might well know whether early elections will be called in Israel. If not by then, then probably soon after.

And complicating the scenario are three corruption investigations into Netanyahu recently completed by Israeli police. We do know that police have recommended that he be indicted in at least two of the cases. News reports last month suggested Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit was likely to decide on whether to proceed with indictments in the first four months of 2019.

The Israeli public opinion polls I saw about a month ago indicated Likud was on track to win the most Knesset seats in the next election. But that was before the latest Gaza skirmishes and the ceasefire that seems to be leading toward the coalition’s collapse – and before Netanyahu’s possible indictment on corruption charges.

Will the coming months bring a sea change to Israeli politics and government? Stay tuned!

December 12, 2016: Ontario legislature stands against the BDS movement

By Michael Regenstreif

On December 1, the Legislative Assembly of Ontario, voted overwhelmingly to condemn the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel.

Motion 36, submitted by Conservative MPP Gila Martow (Thornhill), said the legislature should: “Stand firmly against any position or movement that promotes or encourages any form of hatred, hostility, prejudice, racism and intolerance in any way; Recognize the longstanding, vibrant and mutually beneficial political, economic and cultural ties between Ontario and Israel, built on a foundation of shared liberal democratic values; Endorse the Ottawa Protocol on Combating Antisemitism; And reject the differential treatment of Israel, including the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement.”

The motion passed with a vote of 49 in favour and just five opposed. The governing Liberals and the Progressive Conservative Party – the official Opposition – supported the motion while the New Democratic Party was opposed.

Almost half the members, including three-quarters of NDP members, and almost all Ottawa-area MPPs were not in the legislature at the time of the vote. The only Ottawa member present was Progressive Conservative Lisa MacLeod (Nepean-Carleton), who spoke in favour of the motion during the debate.

With the vote, the Ontario legislature follows the House of Commons, which passed a similar motion in February. Comparable motions have also been passed by the United States Congress and 16 U.S. states.

Among the criticisms of the BDS movement is that it unfairly places entire responsibility on Israel for lack of progress in resolving Israel’s conflict with the Palestinians, and completely absolves Palestinians – both the Palestinian Authority, which holds power in the West Bank, and Hamas, which holds power in Gaza – of any accountability at all. This is despite the fact that the Palestinians walked away on numerous occasions from nearly completed agreements and have used every subterfuge at their disposal to avoid further negotiations – despite Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s repeated invitations to sit down without preconditions and negotiate a peace agreement and Palestinian state.

And, while I don’t believe that all BDS activists are antisemitic, or, antisemitic in their intent, antisemitism is at the root of the BDS movement in that it unilaterally stigmatizes the world’s only Jewish state with all responsibility for the situation. This is what renowned human rights activist and former justice minister of Canada Irwin Cotler has referred to as “the new antisemitism” in which Israel is singled out as “the Jew among nations.”

Pro-BDS groups, though, like to paint themselves as the true human rights activists and deny there is any element of antisemitism in their actions or intent. But, just two days before the BDS vote in the Ontario legislature, pro-BDS groups at Ryerson University in Toronto prevented the Ryerson Student Union from even voting on a motion put forward by Ryerson Hillel in support of Holocaust Education Week at the school.

Holocaust Education Week was not about Israel. It was about education and commemoration of the worst genocide in history – a genocide that was perpetrated just over seven decades ago, in the lifetime of many students’ grandparents, against the Jewish people. To stand against Holocaust education and commemoration is nothing but antisemitism.

If those pro-BDS groups were truly about human rights activism, and if they were not at all antisemitic, they would be among the first standing up in support of Holocaust education and commemoration – not blocking it.

As mentioned, pro-BDS groups like to paint themselves as human rights activists, or as peace groups. But, really, their entire raison d’être is to delegitimate the State of Israel. No less a figure than Norman G. Finkelstein, the former DePaul University professor who is perhaps the world’s most vocal and visible Jewish anti-Zionist, agrees. In a 2012 interview, he attacked the BDS movement, which he repeatedly referred to as a “cult,” for its “silliness, childishness, and a lot of leftist posturing,” in seeking to hide its true goal: the elimination of the State of Israel.

Although the Ontario motion rejecting BDS was put forward by an opposition member, it’s important to note the support it received from the government was unequivocal.

“I want to make this clear,” said Minister of Transport Steven Del Duca, “the Ontario provincial government does not support the BDS movement, or any other positions or movements that attempt to divide our society. Rejecting the boycott of Israel is in keeping with Ontario and Canadian tradition.”

Our legislature has done the right thing.

October 26, 2015: There is never any possible justification for terrorism

 By Michael Regenstreif

As I’ve mentioned before, this column is generally the last thing written before an issue of the Ottawa Jewish Bulletin goes to press, so I often use this space to comment on issues of concern that are in the news while being as up-to-date as is possible when we have to go press 10 days before the official publication date and about a week before the issue begins to arrive in subscribers’ mailboxes.

The two news stories that have dominated my attention as we worked on this issue have been the federal election campaign here in Canada and the terrible wave of terrorism in Israel.

As I write, we are three days away from the October 19 election day. While the votes will have been counted by the time you read this, we can only look at the opinion polls – which may or may not reflect what actually happens at the only polls that ultimately count – and speculate on what will happen and who will form the next government. I expect to have more to say in our next issue on what did happen when we voted.

The latest wave of terrorism has been brutal – at least seven innocent Israelis have been murdered in terrorist attacks in recent days – and so utterly senseless in that the terrorists, many of whom seem to be lone wolves attacking independently, have been inspired, as Barbara Crook notes in her My Israel column, by absolutely false lies and rumours that Israel will seize control or even destroy the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Dome of the Rock, a Muslim holy place built on the site of the ancient Jewish Temples in Jerusalem.

These rumours are not new. When the Second Intifada was launched in 2000, it was said to be in response to a visit to the Temple Mount by Ariel Sharon and his plan to seize control of the Muslim holy place. It turned out, of course, that PLO leader Yasser Arafat had long planned the Intifada.

Then, as now, Israel has been unequivocal that the Al-Aqsa Mosque will remain under the control of the Jordanian Muslim Waqf, as it has since Israel captured eastern Jerusalem from Jordan in the Six-Day War of 1967 and reunited the city.

While much of this latest wave of terrorism has been propagated by so-called lone wolves – some of them very young teenagers – they have been egged on by the highest levels of the Palestinian leadership. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas repeated the claim that Israel would take control of the Al-Aqsa Mosque and has even followed in Arafat’s footsteps by denying the historical existence of the Jewish Temples.

In what was perhaps his most obscene moment of incitement, Abbas took to Palestinian TV on October 14 to claim that Ahmed Mansara, a 13-year-old Palestinian boy, was executed “in cold blood” by Israel.

In fact, Mansara, who was filmed stabbing a Jewish man in Jerusalem, was injured when hit by a car as he attempted to flee the scene of his crime and was recovering well in an Israeli hospital.

Two days later, an unnamed official in Abbas’ office tried to walk back the claim saying Abbas had been misled before making the execution claim. So far, though, Abbas himself has remained silent.

In a speech at Harvard University on October 14, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry blamed the existence of Israeli settlements in the West Bank for the terrorism.

Of course, history tells us that Palestinian terrorism against Israel began years before there was ever an Israeli settlement, and that terrorism from Gaza only increased in the years after Israel shut down its settlements there. The next day, the U.S. State Department walked back Kerry’s statements, suggesting what he meant was the settlements pose an impediment to achieving a two-state solution.

There is never any possible justification for terrorism. In fact, terrorism is always counter-productive as no government (of any country) can allow its citizens to live under such threats for long. The quest for a just peace, for a viable two-state solution to Israel’s conflict with the Palestinians, is always set back by such violence.

Let us hope there will soon be a return to calm and that the quest for real peace will resume.