ISRAEL AND THE COST OF SECOND-CLASS
By Jay Mandle
The effort to dismantle the structure of democratic governance in Israel has been defeated, at least temporarily. Massive street demonstrations have forced Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to delay bringing his “judicial reform” package to a vote in the country’s Knesset. The package, if implemented, would have eviscerated the authority of Israel’s Supreme Court. That, in turn, would have enabled Netanyahu’s narrow legislative majority to construct the theocratic state sought by many members of his coalition.
Netanyahu’s setback joins Joe Biden’s electoral victory over Donald Trump, as well as Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s defeat in Brazil of Jair Bolsonaro, in a global pushback against authoritarian governance. Because millions of people have successfully rallied in defense of democracy, the illiberal ruling regimes in Hungary, Turkey, and increasingly India are not necessarily a vision of the future.
As participation in rallies and marches grew in Israel, a democratic tidal wave emerged. Most dramatically, large numbers of army reservists sided with the demonstrators by refusing to participate in training exercises. Their insubordination compelled the Minister of Defense, Yoav Gallant, to warn the Prime Minister that “thousands more could join this phenomenon if the government doesn’t change course.” In response, Netanyahu first fired Gallant and then, retreating, put a freeze on his Supreme Court legislation.
The victory by liberal Israelis however is fragile. It is entirely possible that the Right, though defeated in the streets, could nevertheless again be successful at the ballot box. In the last few years, Israel has held numerous elections. In each, the electoral vote was split almost evenly between the two sides. In November 2022, only about 30,000 out of the 4.7 million votes cast separated the victorious Right-wing coalition from the opposing parties.
Among the reasons the political Right was victorious in 2022 was the fact that voter turnout in areas of its strength increased after 2021, while liberal turnout declined. Data compiled by Israel’s Center for Governance and the Economy reveal that voter participation fell in liberal bastions – among Kibbitzim by 1.5 percentage points, in Tel Aviv by 0.4, and in other well-off cities by 0.3. At the same time, voter participation increased by 4.9 percentage points in development towns, by 3.6 in big southern cities and by 2.7 among Haredim (religiously orthodox Jews), all of which are sources of right-wing strength.
But also important in the 2022 election outcome was the relatively low voter turnout among Palestinian Israeli citizens, a grouping that comprises almost one-fifth of Israel’s population. Though they opposed Netanyahu nearly unanimously, their 53 percent turnout was far below the national average of 71 percent. This suggests that if Palestinian Israeli citizens had voted at a similar rate as the country as a whole, Netanyahu’s coalition would have been decisively defeated.
The problem, however, is that increased voting among Palestinian Israelis is not likely to occur in the near term. Many in this population are so alienated from the country’s governance system that they see no point in participating in its elections.
There is a long history to this alienation. But as recently as 2018, it intensified. That year, the Knesset adopted “The Nation State of the Jewish People Basic Law.” This law codified that “the Land of Israel is the historical homeland of the Jewish people,” that “the State of Israel is the nation state of the Jewish people,” and that “the realization of the right to national self-determination in the State of Israel is exclusive to the Jewish people.” It was lost on no one that these provisions relegated Palestinian Israeli citizens to an inferior status compared to Jewish citizens. To make matters worse, the very Supreme Court that demonstrators are defending voted 12-1 in 2021 to uphold that the entire law, ruling that it “did not violate the state’s democratic character.”
The alienation of Palestinian Israelis has extended beyond voting to the anti-government demonstrations as well. Few have participated in the mobilization that has rocked the country. Sensitive to their absence, Haaretz – a newspaper sympathetic to anti-government activism – having interviewed six Palestinian Israeli citizens, concluded that they refrained from demonstrating “because of the way the protests overlook the [West Bank] occupation and [the] lack of trust in state institutions.”
None of this is to deny that liberal activism in Israel has, at least for the time being, impeded the country from sliding down a very dangerous slippery slope. If the Netanyahu coalition had not been stopped, Israel could well have become a full-blown theocratic state. But even with the activists’ victory, the precarious nature of Israeli democracy has been revealed for all to see.
Obviously, the inferior status of Palestinian Israeli citizens is inconsistent with democratic and liberal principles. But equally important is that their second-class citizenship deprives the country of an electoral bulwark against religious fundamentalist rule. Overcoming the breach between Palestinian Israelis and the movement would be transformative.
The gap between the two can be closed. But Palestinian skepticism concerning the intentions of mainstream Israeli society runs deep. As a result, initiating gap-closing will fall to the Jewish democratic community if it is to occur at all. To be successful, it will have to convince the Palestinian Israeli population that liberal Israel is committed to eliminating the barriers to their full citizenship.
It remains to be seen whether in the exhilaration of victory, Israeli activists will move to strengthen their cause by extending their egalitarian political efforts to all Israeli citizens. Democracy in Israel may depend on it.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jay Mandle is the Emerita W. Bradford Wiley Professor of Economics, Emeritus,at Colgate University. His many books include Change Elections to Change America: Democracy Matters Students In Action, and Creating Political Equality: Elections As a Public Good,. Mandle’s regular monthly editorials, Money On My Mind, appear on the Democracy Matters website where they explore the role of private money in politics and other critical social issues.
The views expressed in Money On My Mind are those of the author, (not necessarily those of Democracy Matters, and are meant to stimulate discussion.