Call Me Back - with Dan Senor - Special Episode: Update on Israel's political crisis

Episode Date: March 28, 2023

In this special episode we play a conversation that Dan recently had on the Commentary Magazine podcast on the current crisis, how Israel got here and where it goes from here. Be sure to subscribe to Commentary Magazine and its podcast: https://www.commentary.org/

Well, certainly in large parts of Israeli society, the growth of the Haredi community has been simmering for a while. And there is a segment of the Israeli population who feel like they are the most productive citizens economically in the country. They are generating all the economic growth that this country depends on, while this Haredi community, which is growing fast and furious from their perspective, not only does not contribute to the economic growth, many of them are in some sort of government assistance. And the same population that is making is the biggest contributor to Israel's economy through high tech and other parts of the economy are also the ones who are

serving in the military and whose sons and daughters are risking their lives to serve in the military in order to protect the country in which this Haredi population does not serve in the military and has this exemption. So the same population wakes up and says, we see he's leading a government populated by all these people who are making it harder and harder for us to live in this country where we pay disproportionate taxes, our children serve in the military, and these people do none of that. And now they're running the government. So judicial reform just became the match for these other issues. Welcome to this special episode of Call Me Back, in which we release a conversation I just had with the Commentary Magazine podcast, one of my favorite podcasts, as listeners to this podcast know.

And in that conversation, we break down how Israel got to this moment, this political crisis, this judicial crisis, and where it goes from here. Now, a number of you have asked me over the last couple months, since the beginning of January, why, given that I dedicate so many episodes of this podcast generally to Israel, why we haven't had a conversation on this podcast about the judicial debate. It's largely because I felt too close to it to lead a conversation on it. I'm in regular touch with Israelis on all sides of the debate, and many of those conversations are in confidence, and I just felt like I couldn't lead a proper discussion on this podcast without compromising some of those conversations, so I just steered clear of it. But we've entered a new phase. Things have calmed down a little, hopefully, and I think I have more room in the weeks ahead to discuss where I think all of this

is going and bring guests on to talk about where all this is going. In fact, later this week, we are having Yaakov Katz, the editor-in-chief of the Jerusalem Post, return to the podcast. He's a regular, very thoughtful guy, following events closely, both the debate over judicial reforms, the larger political crisis, the implications for Israeli politics and the Israeli government, and then what security concerns hang in the balance that are part of the surround sound that was a motivating factor for a number of the protagonists in this debate to bring down the temperature in recent days. So today you'll hear my conversation with the crew at the Commentary Podcast, and in a couple days, look out for another episode with Yakov Katz. This is Call Me Back.

Welcome to the Commentary Magazine Daily Podcast. Today is Monday, March 27th, 2023. I am Jon Podhoretz, the editor of Commentary Magazine. With me, as always, media commentary columnist and American Enterprise Institute fellow, Christine Rosen. Hi, Christine. Hi, Jon. Washington commentary columnist and American Enterprise Institute fellow, Matt Continetti. Hi, Matt. Hi, Matt. Hi, John. And joining us today to bring insight on one of the most interesting and dramatic stories in the world today, a man so

plugged in that his computer literally blew up because he has so much inside access and information, had to reboot, we're starting late because of that host of the call me back podcast commentary inc board member uh author of startup nation dan senor dan welcome to the podcast as you i i actually thought you were having me on to talk about the season premiere of succession uh which was which was last night and my that was why my computer was blowing up just a lot of commentary a lot of reaction to the first episode. But I guess we're going to do that and then do a little bit of Israel. Okay, well, you can do that. I don't watch Succession.

I know you don't. It's just perplexing to me. It's perplexing to me. Out of loyalty to my longtime friend, supporter, and sometime employer, Rupert Murdoch, of whom the show is a savage caricature. But it's not. We don't have to get into it. It's not about the Murdoch, of whom the show is a savage caricature. But it's not. We don't have to get into it. It's not about the Murdochs. It really isn't. I felt disloyal watching it, and so I didn't watch

it. Also, Adam McKay makes it, and he makes me sick. Anyway, but I hope you enjoy it. I hope everybody watching Succession enjoys it, because you should only enjoy, you should only thank God you have your health and you should enjoy some peak tv but dan you that get that meant that you had an hour

yesterday where you weren't thinking about what was going on in israel and uh talked about a little bit what talked some about this on on friday but even since friday very dramatic events have happened but i want to pull back to 30 000 feet in part because by the time people listen to this the story is maybe shifting may shift between the time we tape this and the time you hear it as we're sitting here we're waiting for bb netanyahu to speak there's some idea that he might not speak until after a possible rally of his forces in jerusalem to counter the rally uh of his uh opponents uh elsewhere uh in the country and so we don't really know what's happening so let's pull back to the more Olympian view. And let me, so you and I, just set this up, you and I have been texting about this heatedly and talking about it for six, seven weeks, I would say.

And my line at the beginning- Longer, John. Actually, the reform package was introduced on january 4th of this year oh my god so it's almost three months yeah yeah we've been at it okay so it's not always been friendly banter right no so you and i have had the you had this disagreement at the beginning and i think that we are maybe coming more into confluence as as as events have progressed, which is I was on the fine, so they're protesting. Look, the right coalition won the election, won 64 seats, and it ran on a series of issues, and it's trying to put these issues before the public.

And as happens when you win an election and you form a government, and that's how particularly parliamentary systems work, and the losers are crying foul and screaming and yelling, and so what? Like, that's so welcome to what it's like to lose. A lot of us have had the experience of being on the losing side for a long time or not

being on the winning side and that's life and you you said and particularly as the protest started you were like don't go that this something else is happening here the size of these rallies and the patriotism that is being displayed by the people hostile to the netanyahu coalition flying the Israeli flag, talking about Israel's future, saying that they love the country too much to lose what they think they're going to lose without a fight, that this was an order of difference. Over time, as my piece in the latest issue of commentary indicates, I have moved closer to your view tactically which is to say that i think that the netanyahu government or the coalition made huge tactical

errors in pushing things this aggressively so much change so fast they won an undeniable election but they did not win a landslide they did not win a huge mandate and they're acting like they did. And they pushed it too far and they, they terrified their opponents and they have unnerved some of their supporters with their aggressiveness. And you have, I think to some extent moved toward the, you know, something else is going on here. It's not just patriotism and these protests. There's something else going on. So tell me what you think is going on.

First of all, this this before I jump into that, you mentioned this this counter rally, this rally of his supporters. I actually it'll be interesting to see what happens with this rally, because I think it's less about him showing a demonstration of, Netanyahu showing a demonstration of political strength in response to the opposition's rallies and protests, but rather to show force within his own coalition, because he's worried now about the coalition splintering. So I think that is as much about showing Ben-Gvir and others in the coalition that that like he's still got support of the rights so you better or not think you can run but anyways um that's that's secondary and obviously happening in real time look i my view of this from from the beginning was it is true that nathaniel who won an impressive uh election uh i also never believed that he really campaigned on this issue.

On judicial reform. On judicial reform, right. So I, you know, I follow Israeli politics very closely. I was in touch with people who were very involved with this campaign at the most senior levels during the campaign. I mean, I just, this issue just on the periphery, maybe some of them talked about it, but the people around netanyahu uh who were running this campaign were not focused on this issue at all so it's not like they it's this was not their contract with america it's not like they campaigned on it and then they got this incredible electoral victory and then they had a mandate to go do it so that's that's the first

point the second point is that i said you know so the government was formed late December of last year. On January 4th, Yareev Levine, Levine, who's the justice minister, unveiled these reforms. So within days of the government being formed, they come out with this reform package. And it's just like it was full steam ahead. And it was always I always felt that there was not a the government had not the political leaders leading the government had not campaigned on it, really. And B, there didn't seem to be wide support within the right on this. The most notable person who fell into that category was the prime minister. It's not clear to me that Netanyahu actually cared about these issues when you would talk to Netanyahu all he wanted to talk about was there was this unique moment for a variety of reasons to truly isolate Iran in a way that he felt that he felt like he failed to do the last time he was

prime minister there was a unique opportunity to expand the Abraham Accords try to normalize with Saudi Arabia uh and as he put it you know a normalization with Saudi Arabia would mean the end of the true end of the Arab-Israeli conflict. He had all these plans and all these visions. He wasn't that interested in judicial reform. And it was mostly a way to placate Yariv Levine and to a lesser degree, Simcha Rothman, who's another key player on the judicial reforms in his government. And it was like to keep the whole government together. He agreed to go with this and the Haredi parties, the Haredim, the ultra Orthodox wanted a certain piece of the judicial reforms,

which we can talk about. So he kind of like, okay, like I got to keep this government together so I can do the things I want to do. And so I'll go along with these proposals that seem to be important to others. And then the thing took off, like because there was this sense that this wasn't a subject of the campaign. No one was actually focused on it. They went full steam ahead within days of the government being formed. They made clear they weren't interested in any kind of dialogue within the country and consensus to try to sell it. And what we're learning now

is the reason they didn't want that is not because they were worried about Yair Lapid or Benny Gantz. The architects of the judicial reforms were worried about Bibi Netanyahu. They wanted to move this. They were trying to corner him. Right. Right. Because they knew the first Knesset session would end this week, right before Passover. And they had a very short period of time to pass something before then. And Yeriv Levine felt that the moment you make it past Pesach

and you get into the next session of the Knesset, they go on holiday, and then another session of Knesset, it would lose momentum and Netanyahu would get distracted. And they had maximum capital to expend pressuring Netanyahu now. And so that's who they were focused on. And that's why they didn maximum capital to expend pressuring Netanyahu now. And so that's who they were focused on.

And that's why they didn't want to drag this thing out or start getting into negotiations with other players. And we can talk about why it got too hot for the system, and there were some things that actually worried me quite a bit in terms of the public's reaction. But it just got too hot for the system. And the right wasn't united on it. And by the way, when you and I first started talking about it and you were you were sort of poo pooing the protests and you were calling them a bunch of, you know.

You know, left wing elitists and all the rest. One of the reasons I disagreed with you, because I was struck by the number of people on the right, not the hard right, but certainly Likud voters who were showing up at these protests. So that's when I that was my again, it was just a sort of anecdotal sense. But I was like, huh, like, OK, I get the big protests in in on the Ayalon and, you know, in Tel Aviv is the main artery highway. Right. And then around Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv, of course course is the liberal is the you know is the yeah it's a blend of new york city and of manhattan and and and silicon valley and um and so i understood i got that i got it was like after in 2017 or whenever the women's marches were after trump

was elected after trump was sworn in the protests were obviously in all these big blue cities. So it made Tel Aviv is effectively a blue city. So that made sense to me. But then I was like, okay, in Jerusalem, every Saturday night after Shabbat, people are showing up to protest. And these are not tattoo, you know, imprinted, you know, ear pierced left wing types. These are people wearing kippot.

These are religious people who are showing up on Saturday nights after Shabbat in the tens of thousands to protest. Full disclosure, some members of my family, including my mother in her mid 80s. These are not these are people who are right of center. And anyways, so that's that's where it felt like there was something bigger going on than just just a left wing. OK, so that's where it felt like there was something bigger going on than just a left-wing reaction. So obviously something bigger is going on. Like, there's no question that something, you can't, this can't go on for three months and grow in power and grow in strength. All sorts of different things are going on, one of which is that clearly they're having an impact, they're having an effect.

Some of those effects are very dangerous for the health of of israel and and the fact that it's going so well for the protesters either indicates that uh there is a social crisis in israel that this is reflecting or it's engendering a social crisis, mainly the growth in the sense that Israelis who, of course, have universal, almost universal commitments to the military at the age of 18 and then remain as reservists after they leave active duty, that reservists were starting to claim that they would not serve or they would not go do their reserve duty, milluim, when they're called to do so as a protest of the government. The meaning of that, there have been teeny hints of this over the course of the last 25, 30 years, reservist protests against the politics of the sitting government but they're very small and they're very controversial and this is the one moment at which

this could break out causing an immense rupture in uh israeli social solidarity and this sense of a totally combined of a state that understands no matter if you're, I mean, maybe if you're like really, really far, far, far on the left, you no longer have any confidence in the importance of this central commitment to the military. But 90% of the country does, or 90% of the Jews in the country do, and so we're at 95% or something like that. So this is a very big deal and this is actually what is i think unnerving bb more than anything it's the thing he says

publicly well and it's worried about it's what led to the comments by the defense minister right which yes you are now fired yes galant which provoked the crisis of the last 48 hours maybe i'd love to hear dan's thoughts on that because that seems to me what really brought this to a boiling point yeah which was it's interesting before before we go into that because you you've been mentioning playing a little shorthand which is fine because you know it's very hard to pull back here's what's interesting so bb is the head of the likud party there are i don't know seven or eight parties in the coalition um this fight that he is having with yariv levin and simcha rothman is not a fight with outliers in his coalition who are demanding things that he is having to give them or the government will collapse

levine and rothman are members of his own party well rothman isn't rothman's a member of the national religious party i'm sorry right but rothman's okay but levin who is the real risk levin's the actor is a lee is a member of likud theoretically bb doesn't have to you know like didn't have to give him this runway um and another important fisher is that we're talking about this judicial reform having exploded. One of the reasons it exploded is that it's not a classic hot-button issue that has been roiling the Israeli body politic for decades. It's not the West Bank. It's not the administration of the West Bank. It's not the disengagement from Gaza. It's not uh what's going on at the lebanese border it's not uh religious service in the military it's not payments to payoffs to haradi politics

um all of that is stuff that is you know like the minute you bring it up it's like oh you're on this side and we're on that side this looked like it was wonky policy that was being overlaid to change the character to the people who and put it more in keeping with the interests of the more authoritarian and less right as opposed to the more libertarian left or something like that. And that's one of the reasons it exploded is that it did not break along conventional Israeli political lines. It wasn't like abortion in America, where you can literally chart who's on what side or something like that. It was a new and brilliant, if you think about it, not that I think anybody did this consciously, but there's a model to follow in politics from henceforth from this which is don't go to the obvious see if you can organize on a slightly ancillary matter and then might you might be able to bring in people who are unnerved

by the scope of the ambition of that wonky proposal aren't they unnerved because of the nature of the governing coalition yeah and is i mean i think i think that if this were had been a typical bb coalition which is likud and then you know some other center right parties maybe even a center left party and they had gone with judicial reform it would not have been it would have been controversial because this is a major structural change to the israeli government that they're attempting but it would not not have the tenor of crisis that's surrounding it. And it's because this current coalition is in partnership with Ben-Gavir and with Smotrich and these parties that have never really had an opportunity to rule Israel before that I think is sending the shockwaves. Well, that's very important, but that's that's not what they're saying.

Right. They're saying we just don't like the judicial reform proposal. And but it is. You're right. But but but I think but Matt is also right that this is I mean, why did this thing get so much steam, this the reaction to the judicial reform? Because it wasn't just about the judicial reform because it wasn't just about the judicial reform i mean it was it was so so what was really going on it was it was partly about the judicial reform so some some were reacting to that others were reacting to the fact that bb got re-elected in any when regardless of what government he formed i mean this imagine i mean just to give it an imperfect analogy, imagine if Trump had gotten elected in twenty twenty four reelected. I mean, imagine

how people would just be going insane, like really insane. So there's an element of people just going insane. They cannot they thought Bibi was done politically and then he's back. And and I think they would have had this reaction regardless of what kind of the composition of whatever government he formed. But especially to your point, Matt, the kind of government he formed. So the way he got back. And then lastly, it is a reaction to demography. It's a reaction to Haredi ultra orthodox strength. And and this is something, you know, for some on the right, the judicial reform issue has been kind of brewing for a while, even if even if it wasn't a central campaign theme. Well, certainly in large parts of Israeli society, the growth of the Haredi community has also been simmering for a while.

And there is a segment of the Israeli population who you just hear it. I've been hearing this for years, who feel like they are the most productive citizens economically in the country. They are generating all the economic growth that this country depends on, while the Haredi community, which is growing fast and furious from their perspective, not only does not contribute to the economic growth, but is actually, you know, they're recipients of all this growth directly. is actually, you know, a, you know, they're, they're recipients of all this growth directly. They're not, they're not net contributors by and large, some exceptions. So, you know, many, many of them are in some sort of government assistance and the same

population that is making, is the biggest contributor to Israel's economy through high tech and other parts of the economy are also the ones who are serving in the military and whose sons and daughters are risking their lives to serve in the military in order to protect the country in which this Haredi population does not serve in the military and has this exemption. And so that divergence in terms of who you know whose whose country is it if you will uh is has been bubbling up for a while so that's the same the same population wakes up and says okay so netanyahu's prime minister he's not well we we aren't like necessarily like terribly hostile to him for some some of the some parts of this of this uh demographic that we're turning out in the streets but um but we wake up and we see he's leading a government populated by all these people

who are, who are, who are making it harder and harder for us to live in this country where we pay disproportionate taxes, our children serve in the military, and these people do none of that. And now they're running the government. And so I just think all that got layered on to so judicial reform just became the match for these other issues so how does he because go ahead i was going to ask real quickly if if as this has been you know discussed this morning he netanyahu decides to freeze the reform effort and try to kind of backpedal and reset is there something he can give those people to

satisfy them or is it has it gone to orthodox or the or the or the people opposing them, the people who oppose the ultra orthodox? I mean, I think this is look, I don't think they will be, you know, actually mollified until Netanyahu is gone from politics. I just think they're they're amped up. I mean, one of the elements of this whole protest movement is it got so hot. And Yair Lapid, who's, you know, the leader of the opposition, tried to kind of own this opposition, you know, own this reaction that was going on in the country. And he was, you know, speaking at all the rallies. But he it was it was almost bigger than him. Like he can't control it. I mean, what is he going to say now? You know, he, you know, Netanyahu has blinked, he's folded, everyone calmed down. I just think if you look at the polling, all his political strength now is coming from this reaction to Netanyahu. I'm not so sure he's so incentivized to tamp it down. I will say the one the one

worrying sign, which, which john you talked about a little bit uh about a few minutes ago that that all the leaders in fairness are worried about obviously nathaniel is worried about it gonz benny gonz who's the leader of another party not formerly the leader of the opposition but in the opposition blue and white who's formerly nathaniel's defense minister uh two governments ago Gantz is worried about this. And even Lapid is apparently worried about it and has said some things about this idea of the reservists taking a position not to show up to reserves,

which, John, you're right. It has happened. It last happened in 2002. Do you remember there was this... It's a father. Well, Salah Shahadeh, who's this Hamas strong man that that the the IDF or the Air Force did an operation on where they dropped like a one ton bomb on his home in Gaza in 2002 is before including eight children. And there was a little bit of a backlash in the Israeli public, small, but a bunch of Israeli Air Force pilots, reservists, wrote a letter to Shulamu Faz, who was the defense minister at the time, it was Ariel Sharon's government, saying, we're done,

we're not serving, we won't show up. And this was, I i think 27 of them was the total number 27 reservists maybe some active military but it's mostly reservists said that they were that this was their protest that they thought that this was immoral and this was a huge deal this was a huge deal was debated in the knesset what they should do about these 27 um uh members of the air force they gave them the opportunity to you know know, reconsider, rethink, and then come in and apologize, explain what they're thinking. The whole thing tempered down. Now, just to put it in context, what really apparently flipped out Galan to the current, up until a couple of days ago, the current defense minister, was that 200 Israeli Air

Force reservists said they weren't going to show up for training this week. So the way it works with the Air Force is if you are a reservist, so most of the standing army of the IDF is about 170,000 personnel, but the reservists is where the real strength of the IDF comes from, which is about 465,000 in the reserves. And so the Israel security really depends on these reservists. Now, most of these reservists have a volunteer. So if you're actually in the standing army,

you're required to serve. But the reservists, it is a volunteer-based relationship. So you're technically, you can say I'm not showing up. The problem is where the Air Force is the most sensitive is you're living your normal life.

You're an Air Force reservist. If you are flying fighter jets, you show up once a week to train, to fly, to get your fly time in. Like I, you know, over the weekend, over Shabbat, I had a friend over who's a former Air Force pilot just until recently. Not over this. He just aged out. He was a venture capitalist in Tel Aviv, and every Thursday afternoon, he'd go to his base and he'd fly for a few hours. That's what they do to stay current. And the protocol apparently, and I go, I've heard different views of this,

because it's not public information, but the protocol is something like, if you miss four weeks of flying, so for some reason you can't fly for four weeks, you're out. Meaning not out permanently, but meaning if there's a security situation that requires the Air Force, they're not calling on you because that's how quickly you become uncurrent if you just miss four weeks. And he told me he sometimes, if he had to miss one or two weeks, he already felt like a little soft when he was doing it. So for 200 of these pilots to say we're not showing up, and then if they say they're not showing up the first week, what if they second week and third week? Now, we don't know how many

pilots there are in Israel. That also is classified, right? So the Israeli government doesn't publicize how many pilots because it's one of the most valuable national security assets. But assume it's not a lot, right? Like it's a small number. So 200 of a small number is a lot. And the analogy this former pilot put to me is he says, you know, think about during COVID in the U.S. when there were all these American military personnel who refused to get vaccinated, right? And so they were told they couldn't serve. So he said, so suppose a thousand American pilots,

Air Force pilots said, that's it, we're not getting vaccinated, we won't serve. He said, who cares? He said, first of all, the difference between the U.S. and America is the U.S. can fight its wars at a time of its choosing. Israel can't. So having these pilots ready to go at any moment is everything. And secondly, obviously, the scale, 1,000 pilots in the United States relative to the size of the whole Air Force is minuscule. By the way, this is someone who was not as hostile to the reforms, to the judicial reforms as some of his peers in the Air Force, but he was alarmed by this number. He was alarmed by the 200 and the security implications. And so I think that, plus what was going on in some of the other units, 8200, which is the elite

intelligence tech unit, there was also some grumblings of protests there. And so I just think this was coming to Gallant, as Matt said. I mean, you listen to what he said. He said the situation with the military's reaction, the reservist's reaction, his exact words were, it is a clear, immediate, immediate, intangible threat to the security of Israel. Now, God knows what else he's seeing from an intelligence perspective, right? Like stuff's heating up with Iran. Stuff is heating. There was that infiltration from the north, from Lebanon. Someone from Hezbollah broke into Israel, which was a real worrying sign the last couple weeks.

They had this like manhunt for this Hezbollah operative or whatever who had gotten into Israel and was there for a few days. At any moment, there's a sense that the Palestinian Authority can collapse and Israel would have literally a third intifada. So, you know, this is what we know from public sources. Like I said, God knows what Galant is seeing. So he's seeing Israel's security situation becoming more precarious at the exact same time that Israel's true most important national security resource is saying we're not saying we're out but we're saying we're not showing up for work uh i mean this this this brings up a question because from sort of an american perspective you we see a lot of protest movements go wrong um go bad uh if you just sort of watch long enough either in their tactics or they start to demand sort of extraneous things that are that are beside the initial point.

And then there's a sort of public turn against them. What you're talking about with the reservists. Is this the thing that makes it go bad or that brings the judicial judicial reformers to their knees probably the latter i mean i think that's what we're going to hear today i i think there's no question that bb i don't care what happens at the rally today dan alluded to this earlier this is not his issue um and the genius of the protests in part politically is that it's now his issue according to everybody and that he's only really done this because he wants 270 000 he wants to get 270 000 from a dead relative he wants the uh prosecute you know prosecutions of him to go away. This is all, this is all his own personal corrupt intent. And that's obviously, you know, it's very hard.

What is he going to say? No, I don't want that. Or I, you know, whatever there, he has no answer. It's why this was a tough issue for them to go ahead with first, because although he wanted – I think he wanted this idea that he was – should basically be relatively immune from prosecution or removal from office or not be in a position where the Supreme Court, which is one of the provisions, would ask him essentially like the 25th Amendment to take a leave of absence until his trial was fulfilled or something like that. Some of these provisions are part of this larger judicial reform package. And it's not that he wouldn't want that.

It's that this wasn't what jazzed him. And to the extent that building coalitions like this, deal with the devil is the wrong – that's the phrase that comes to mind. I'm not characterizing the people that he made the deal with as the devil. It just means making a deal with people that you might otherwise not really want to make a deal with. His political genius over the last year, and he is a political genius, was to get these two disparate right-wing extremists to join together. party so that they would uh they would hit certain landmark numbers and they they would be much they would be better off together because they could get more votes together than a part and they could get more seats together than a part and he would be better off because they would come into coalition with him they could consolidate consolidate this, not exactly Haredi. It's a whole,

it's a more complicated political movement that they're part of. And he could consolidate them and bring them in, but bring them in, even though they are not the motive actors of the judicial reform either, by the way, but bringing them in, which got him the coalition and got him back into the premiership denny has to run the government that they're in and you know it's like a poison

chalice or it's a very difficult chalice to handle because they are they're there as a constant reminder 24 hours a day two people who might otherwise want to negotiate with him or figure out how to calm this down that if they calm it down they're still there as the second most powerful member of the coalition and they're going to want things and you know the best thing to do might be to get bb out of office how that happens the only way it's going to happen by the way is if they pull the plug on the government that's the other irony like these which is a possibility which is a possibility well bank veer is apparently saying who's the leader of of one of these factions of the of the hardline national religious party he he's saying that he is, he's apparently threatening to resign from the government if,

if the reforms are halted, but he will support the government in opposition. So this is the way actually, ironically, the Arab parties have often operated in over in Israeli history where they've not been part of certain governments, but they, but they have supported the government from outside. so the government still had the votes to exist but they weren't serving in the government so they it's it's a weaker government okay so let me just you mentioned you know your your friends and relatives and how they felt about what was going on uh and i'll talk about mine um so but you're really going as my relatives my relatives

but the early going of the government very jewish podcast yeah really if you were a certain type of person and this should be very recognizable to americans you know who listen to this podcast the drinking of liberal tears of israeli liberal tears the fact that they were moving on all they were firing on all cylinders they got in and they hit the ground running they did judicial front they were doing this they were doing that they were doing the other thing they were pointing this they were going there they're going there was like it was like a dream come true after years of sclerosis like you know basically there hasn't been a functioning domestic government in israel for eight years like that could get anything done on the domestic front and like not only that but it was like

everything you want including judicial reform which is a wonky, was a major issue in Israel among wonkier people. Not that it was like a huge populist issue, but for reasons that we've outlined before. And also the fact that Rothman specifically basically said, Rothman and and Levin said we're not negotiating what here's what we're gonna we're the way this works in Israel is you have to have three readings of a bill before it becomes law and it is in the course of that process that there are emendations made in the bill right so over time and the idea was they weren't gonna negotiate they weren't negotiating they were gonna push it through push it through push it through, push it through, push it through. And then as, as Javi Vereda-Gur says in a superb piece in the times of Israel, I commend

to everybody's attention today. At the end, when, when, when the train was like just about to pull into the station, maybe they would show some mercy and negotiate. So they said, we're not negotiating. And the response of the opposition was to say, we're not negotiating. You agree to negotiate or we're not ending these protests. And then the protests took on a life of their own. And so I think it felt really good, felt like you were doing what you were supposed to do

to get the government going as fast as it did. And that was a huge tactical political error. It was too much for the country to absorb all at once. And again, without a huge mandate, and there have been huge mandates in Israeli political history. Ariel Sharon's election in 2003, he got like 74 seats or something, if I remember correctly.

I mean, it was a huge landslide. It's not like there haven't been these things that just level the opposition. The opposition in that, basically, on the issue of the Palestiniansestinians and foreign pop various other things was basically leveled for a generation as a result of that one election this election was just not decisive enough to level opposition to the judicial reforms and the way that they were acting as though it was so i, I suppose it was worth a try. And then, yeah, but John, John, can I just I'm sorry, but again, I keep coming

back to this point. OK. Netanyahu is like the is the lead, like he's like the action figure in this new government. He's the guy with the cape and the S on his shirt that came and brought the right back to life and and and built this government that your family and some members of my family, I should say, were excited about. But that he didn't seem to be involved in any of this. So so there's all this energy around this stamp, this steamroller of a reform agenda. But the one missing character now, part of it is he had an agreement with the attorney general that in the Supreme Court that he couldn't participate in these in this debate because of his own legal issues. Conflict of interest. Conflict of interest. Right. And so so that constrained him. And he like just look at his schedule. Right. This past weekend, he was in London meeting with Rishi Sunak.

Two weeks ago, he was in Germany meeting with Olaf Scholz. Literally, like every couple of weeks, he was traveling to a foreign country. He was begging Washington, begging the Biden administration for to give him a visit to Washington. What what was the purpose of all these trips? Iran, he believes this is a unique moment where he thinks the Biden administration is done with the JCPOA. He believes the Biden administration now is very frustrated with Tehran because of what they're doing to support Putin and its war in Ukraine. He thinks that that a

number of European countries are now more open on a harder line remains to be seen what on Iran that they haven't in the past. So he thought and then he had Saudi. I mean, he thought this was his moment. That's how he wanted to be spending his time. So it's one thing to say that there are people in Israel who are so excited that this new government was formed and that they're owning the libs, if you will. The one person who didn't seem that excited about it was the prime minister. Well, and this controversy is eroding his ability to conduct this diplomacy. And I just, I mean, a couple of things. One is, it's funny what Dan said, that this judicial reform was not what the coalition really campaigned on. As I recall, a couple of things. One is it's funny what Dan said, that this judicial reform is not what the coalition really campaigned on.

As I recall, the central issue in the election was public safety and decline in the rule of law. And the one of the reasons Ben-Givir was so successful is he was going to say, finally, you know, the gloves are coming off. Ironically, what's happened since the public safety and the rule of law is deteriorating. More Israelis have been killed in the last few months than all of last year, which was a bigger number than like the last 10 years. So right. And and the fact that now you have reservists not saying that they're not going to show up for duty. I mean, that is a direct rebu It reminds me a little bit of George W. Bush know for the uh for the american effort after the after the initial hostilities concluded in 2003 and i remember um so not to mention another family member but my brother-in-law elliot abrams who was working in the bush white house coordinating middle east policy bush's focus this is where you can't you know bush's focus in april may of 2003 was no famine there was worry that there was going to be there was going to be a

terrible crisis in the delivery of food and and and and goods and that and that elliot was to focus his attention on making sure that you know that this was not a crisis and uh he did i mean they did and this was very important it was not that it wasn't a thing to think about it just meant that they didn't see what was coming from the angle. You know what I mean? It's like it's an interesting thing where politicians get fixated or fixed on one thing or they think they're doing something good and noble or something like that. And and they can check it off in a box and say, OK, I've handled this. I can go on. And you just don't know where things are coming from and it may be that

bb who was 74 years old simply doesn't have the um i don't know what you would call them the the instincts or the or the flexibility to to move uh with the issue um and and stayed focused on his thing when fought you know a bb 10 years ago would have seen these protests building up and probably would have responded to them immediately or he's in fact he did in 2011 there were protests the economic social right food rent right inflation protests and he jumped all over it he jumped all i mean i don't know he didn't and this was not an issue he cared about and he pivoted you're right john there were there were 20 000 people tents in the streets of tel aviv and it i i remember being there at that time that summer with it was a congressional delegation and they were like what the hell

is going on in this country i mean it was like it looked looked like a bad version a worse version of san francisco today and netanyahu this is the last thing he wanted to work on. And he jumped all over it. And he put together that that Manuel Trachtenberg Commission, an economic commission, and he he made it his issue. So, you know, you want to if you're a politician, you always want to talk about what you want to talk about. And do think we should talk about biden here though because what you know dan is saying that he uh bb may have spied an opportunity to uh rally a coalition against iran to expand the abraham accords and going into the government that was all that we were hearing um from his allies. And Biden's actions here are very troubling to me. You know, on the one hand, you have this new Chinese-brokered Saudi-Iranian alliance, or rapprochement, detente. And the

Biden administration is like, yeah, sure, good with us. We'll see what happens uh over the weekend or or toward the end of last week the joint chief of chairman of the joint chiefs of staff general milley said that well you know with iran we're really concerned if they uh with the fielded weapon now this is i mean this is a very close reading but that is different from saying iran will never get a nuclear weapon a fielded weapon i mean what, what if, you know, you're going to let them move it out on the track, the track like like Kim Jong Un, and that's when you're going to take action. And we continue to get from the Biden administration the sense that, yes, you know, the JCPOA may be dead now. We don't really see any current hopes for revival. But you know,

if Iran wants to return to the track of diplomacy, we're willing to accept them. Meanwhile, in the midst of all of this and all the protests that were triggered by galants firing by Netanyahu over the weekend, the National Security Council issues a statement. We're very concerned. We're very concerned with the judicial reform. We're very concerned. We're very concerned with the judicial reform. We're very concerned about what it means for liberal values and democratic values in Israel. Now, you know, France is burning too. And I don't see the National Security Council issuing a statement saying we're very concerned about Macron and what's happening in France. So I think there's a, there's a, if Bibi really thinks he can work with the Biden administration here,

he might have to think again. Well, okay. So I, the last role I want to play on the commentary podcast is defending the Biden administration. I, I, I'm, that is,

that is not why John called me on. It's always a thankless job. Thankless job. Exactly. So that said, I, I don't think the comparison to what's happening in France works because what's happening in France, which is, by the way, fascinating, is not does not actually have implications for the stability of geopolitics. And I think the Biden administration looks at some of the players that were populating Netanyahu's government and saying, these guys are maniacs.

Ben-Gvir Smoltrich. I mean, Smoltrich last week, he's standing with a map that doesn't have, that there's no presence of the Palestinian know, the Palestinian territories on it. You know, I mean, we can go on and on. Ben Smoltrich basically having his own office in the defense ministry. He's like a quasi defense minister. Ben Gvir overseeing the police on the heels of like, what, 70, 80,000 people were showing up,

planning to show up for Ramadan at the at the last week in the Dome of the Rock. I mean, it's just like there's it's a little bit of a powder keg and they're pushing these these outposts that are very controversial, even in Israeli circles, annexing these these parts of the West Bank and building these settlements. So I think that Biden administration is not necessarily reacting to judicial reform like like so many in Israel. It's like about judicial reform, but it's not about judicial reform. I think the Biden administration, it's like, sure, they're reacting to judicial reform like like so many in israel it's like about judicial reform but it's not about judicial reform i think the biden administration it's like sure they're commenting on judicial reform but that's not really what they're

commenting on what they're commenting on is who's in charge of this crazy government from their perspective and they may do something stupid that could like you know light up the region i think that's overwrought i don't think that's going to happen. But, you know, that is the mindset of administrations generally, Democrat and Republican. They're worried about some provocative action by a right wing member of an Israeli government that suddenly just creates a headache. And one thing the Biden administration does not want between now and November of twenty twenty four are headaches in the foreign policy scene. They just want quiet. I also do not want to defend the Biden administration. I just do want to say one thing,

which is, you know what this would have been like had Biden's former boss been president. They would prefer never to say the word Israel if they could help it. They don't want to be involved in this. Thomas Nides, the ambassador, does not want to be a central player in a domestic Israeli dispute, as opposed to his opposite number, his predecessor, Martin Indyk in the Obama administration, who wanted nothing more than to be Israel's prime minister.

Who, by the way, flew Israel to join the protests. Think about that. He's a former U.S. ambassador to Israel. He's no longer ambassador. He went to Israel to show solidarity with the protesters. No, but I mean, he wanted to be prime minister of Israel. Biden would like, that's all. I'm not defending their conduct.

But wouldn't you agree, though, that, I agree, the most important words in life are compared to what? Compared to the Obama administration, the Biden administration's response is preferable. However, wouldn't you also agree that Biden would prefer that this government collapse and Benny Gantz become the prime minister of Israel, or somehow Yair Lapid is able to get to a high level. I mean, I do think what we have seen since this coalition came to power and Biden waited forever to give a call to Bibi, you have gone on the cold shoulder to Bibi. Now, maybe that's partly because of the

characters involved in the coalition, but I also do think that Bideniden yes i agree he's not as bad as obama at the same time i think that he said they see an opportunity here they would rather that this coalition disappear and someone more of a government of more of like mind come to power well well let's talk about that for a minute because this is actually where things get get in because christine sort of alluded to this also bb will probably announce some kind of a freeze or compromise or something today or if not today by wednesday i mean he fired galant three days ago and he's now essentially going to adopt galant and by the way everything has to stop really because pas Passover kicks in. I mean, the country shuts down.

Yeah, that's a week from Wednesday. But the Knesset session is supposed to go until Thursday. There's not much time. Yeah, okay. So it's the street theater that is going to have a hard time shutting down. It is supercharged. It is emotionally wrought. It is thrilled. It is, you know, in a state of high dungeon, high excitement, high enthusiasm.

If you listen to interviews and stuff with people on the street they seem mishuga and that includes friends of mine who are tweeting out mishuga pictures of themselves cheering in the streets of tel aviv uh so it's going to be very hard for them to back down and this i think is the ultimate thing i want to ask you dan if i mentioned this to you in a in a in a text but um what's interesting to me is that the emotions seem very comparable to paris in 68 may the may 68 um revolution in paris except and this is why because that that came to nothing but it i mean it revolutionized french society in many ways but that came to nothing. But it revolutionized French society in many ways, but it came to nothing politically,

or didn't come to much politically. So here, the thing is that that was a war, a revolt against an esclerotic establishment. Here, this is an establishment revolt against a resurgent populist resentful underclass, whatever you want to call it. And it turns out that's a really exciting model for a revolt because you have the newspapers. You have the universities. The universities shut down today in solidarity.

Everybody shut down. The big national labor union shut down they shut down the airport they shut down the country BB's own defense attorney on case 4000 said I'm not I can no longer work for you literally New York the consul general of New York

it's like if you have the levers of the establishment and you're doing a protest against unjust government that's like if you have the levers of the establishment and you're doing a protest against unjust – this is – that's like – I don't know. There's no – I can't think of anything comparable. Maybe the pussyhat scenes of 2017, but of course they didn't have any legislative oomph. And so it's going to be hard for them to step down it's an amazing kind of achievement of organization and tactics and stuff like that but biden may want the government to collapse if it collapses the results are not going to be markedly different i don't think i don't think you're going to get a left of you're

going to get a a centrist government that replaces this government i mean who there's no way of knowing there's no but i mean so volatile and nothing yeah who may swap out smoltrich ben veer and try to bring in guns yeah there's a whole bunch of to create a kind of government that resembled what governments he's had in the past, to Matt's point. I mean, who knows? I will say, though, that what worries me, you know, there were some very worrisome developments that happened over the last few weeks, and there were some very actually heartening and encouraging. The worrisome is this, again, I keep coming back to it, this reservist revolt is just something that went to a whole other level. And, you know, I'm just trying to think the implications.

If you look at the Israeli military, it's increasingly being populated, not dominated, but increasingly populated by young national religious Israelis, right? Keep wearing people like, you know, Bennett, you know what I mean? People, former Prime Minister Bennett. I mean, people like that from that not not Ben-Gurion small church types, but real impressive young Israelis who who become officers and serve in elite units, but are very religious and very conservative, very right wing. So what happens 10 years from now, say, if there's a left wing government that wants to do a version of the 2005 disengagement from Gaza, but they're going to do some kind of disengagement from the West Bank and they have to do what Sharon did in 2005, which is forcibly remove, you know, thousands of Israelis from their homes and dig up cemeteries and all that. Imagine 10 years from now, a left wing government has their centrist government has to do that in parts of the West Bank. And they tell the army to do these forcible removals and these young soldiers say i'm out reservists say i'm out i'm not doing it there's precedent for it because in 2023 all these i mean

i just i that well that's in that sense you breach yeah you you you you break a you break a guard rail and you can't just can i can i tell a quick family story then we got to go but i got it because another and then i got to say one positive note but okay but about the about the disengagement so i want to give you an example of this 2005 the disengagement my my nephew alone was in gaza uh very much opposed to the disengagement. He had to go, he had to climb into windows and pull people out of their houses. And as he was doing it, he was sobbing,

and they were sobbing. But these were his orders. He wasn't a reservist then, he an active duty but i mean this is what you do when you are in the military you are not policymakers you are the military of a democratically elected government that is doing what it you know what we elect people to do which is to fill out policy based on what they run on. And they did it. A lot of people were there in 2005 hating the disengagement, and they did what they had to do under the classic rules of serving in the military.

And I think this example that you give, Dan, of what happens if service in the military becomes conditional in the minds of israelis about the justice or value or virtue of the tasks that they are being asked to perform that in a country as it's not that ideologically divided it's less ideologically divided that we realize actually uh when it comes to surf you know like 90 of people in israel believe that they need to do what they're doing on Iran or even more seriously, for example, but, uh, that's a huge thing. And we can see that as a kind of, that's the Rubicon, you know, you, if that, if that happens,

there is a, the country has a huge problem. Okay. Please. My positive note is you, you alluded to this early on john i and i i've been saying this to you throughout the protest but i when we've been bantering about it i i still i moved every saturday night when i watch these protests because the people showing up it's just you see a sea of israeli flags they're singing Hatikvah, Israel's national anthem. If you look at the signs, people have these very creative signs that they, you know, and so many of them are about honoring Israeli history, honoring Zionism, honoring Jewish history. There's quotes, you know, biblical quotes. I mean, these are not, these are people who've served in their country, they're proud of their country, they love their country. This is, you can't compare this to the

Black Lives Matter protests after George Floyd or the protest after Trump was elected. You wouldn't be able to find an American flag being weighed. People weren't, this wasn't an indictment of their country. They love their country. Like I said, this wasn't an indictment of their country. They love their country. Like I said, many of these people protesting are people who've served their country. So in that sense, it was a very different kind of protest. I think a lot of pundits over here want to categorize it as like, well, there's the reaction to this

and the happening in Brazil. And there's the reaction in the U.S. This is different. And in that sense, moving. And this is different and in that sense moving. And then the other point I would make is as much as we're going to be reading over the next few days about Israeli society is broken and it's being torn apart. And obviously there are fissures in the society. At the same time, there are these like incredible images like of this protest of these secular Israelis that marched on Bnei Barak last week, this ultra-Orthodox town, you know, in the context of all these protests. And they

marched in, and these Haredim were coming out to the protests on Thursday and Friday morning, I guess, or Thursday, and feeding them cholent, like cholent they had made for Shabbat. And they're feeding the protesters. And there's this one video that was moving around social media. I'll tweet it out. It was it was of a of a Israeli guy who's clearly going to protest in Bnei Barak against the Haredim. And he's wearing a helmet because he thought he was going to get pelted by the Haredim. And he gets to Bnei Barak and he realizes that they disagreed intensely. But there's going to be no violence. There's going to be no, again, they're bringing them children, and they're blasting from the apartment buildings, the inhabitants, the residents of the community, Shalom Aleichem, an Israeli song.

And he's so moved by the moment that while on one hand, he's kind of politically at war with these people that they're like embracing him and they're all brothers. He takes off his helmet and he starts singing with them. And he's like crying. It's an amazing image. And so you were seeing, of course, the press over here won't cover this, but there was something underneath these fissures that remind you that the fissures are about debates over politics. But I still will bet on the strength of Israeli society holding together. Dan Cedar, as ever, unbelievably illuminating.

Listen to the Call Me Back podcast, wherever you get your fine podcasts. Great one this week with Josh Rogin talking about China and Ukraine. Very as illuminating as his comments here. And Matt and Christine. I won't ask John, by the way, why Abe is on the commentary podcast this morning and not on his honeymoon, but you can hit that. Doesn't the guy get a break?

Doesn't he get a break? Because he can't stay away. I think what's going on in Israel is too important to have to be here. The fate of Zion. Well played, Abe. Well played. Without missing a beat.

Thanks for listening to my conversation on the Commentary Podcast. I highly recommend you subscribe to it and also subscribe to the magazine. And there's tons of content on their website and again, their daily podcast is terrific. And look out for another episode to drop in your feed from Call Me Back, which will be my conversation with the editor-in-

chief of the Jerusalem Post, Yaakov Katz, later this week. Call Me Back is produced by Alain Benatar. Until next time, I'm your host, Dan Senor.