Bibi's Comeback

My appearance on Turkish TV election panel with Gideon Levy and Mitchell Barak

Chevra – Don’t Throw Away Your Trump Card !

I have this movie playing in my head. 

It’s set in a parallel Israel where Olmert actually gave back the Golan to Syria and divided Jerusalem back in 2008 as part of his much vaunted ‘67-borders offer to Abbas.

Fast-forward 10 years and, in my movie, the new US President Trump is chatting to Prime Minister Netanyahu in the Oval Office. “Hey Bibi,” he says. “Shame your guys gave away Jerusalem and the Golan. I’d have let you keep both.”

As an orthodox Jew and religious Zionist, I truly believe that the Almighty has protected Israel from the folly of its leaders. The lesson is that we must hold on tightly to what we’ve got - to all the homelands that we have been blessed enough to liberate and for which brave soldiers have made the ultimate sacrifice and for whom their families still grieve.

Remember when Obama shunned Bibi and Barak at that first meeting in his White House? How he left them in a room saying he was off to dinner with his family but to call him if they came up with any ideas (to dismember parts of Eretz Yisrael)?  And how they had to leave by the back door, denied any photo-ops on Obama’s orders? 

I remember that horrible evening. Bibi was not to know that this ‘Ice Age’ would wind up as a two-term presidency. And how it would end with a $150bn lifeline to Iran and Obama kicking Israel under a bus at the UN in his final days of office.

But still, Bibi Netanyahu steered the Israeli ship of state though those stormy seas so that we lived to see the benevolence of the Trump era with our territory intact. Nothing given away. And stronger economically and militarily than ever before.

So, I appeal to Israelis – don’t throw away your Trump card tomorrow.

It Has To Be Bibi

Whatever your party preference in the upcoming Israeli election, there is no denying that Bibi Netanyahu is one of the most experienced and formidable leaders on the world stage today. 

Elected three times and now approaching a record-breaking 10^th year in office it’s hard to name a world leader that comes anywhere close in terms of eloquence, charisma, political savvy and the courage to speak truth to power. Against the advice of what Menachem Begin used to famously deride as ‘Jews with trembling knees’ Netanyahu went to Washington to oppose Obama’s capitulation to Iran and got no less than 26 standing ovations in the US Congress for his trouble.

Now, seriously - can you visualize Gantz doing that?

Benny Gantz deserves our respect and admiration as a fighter and leader of the IDF, but as a prime minister he is way out of his league. It’s not as if we’ve had much success with military brass in the prime minister’s chair. Yitzchak Rabin was totally out of his depth when dragged into the Oslo disaster by the politically savvy Peres, whom he famously called an ‘inveterate schemer’. Then there was Ehud Barak, who in a term of less than two years had offered 97 percent of the West Bank to a terrorist organisation and surrendered South Lebanon to Hezbollah.  And it’s Ariel Sharon we have to thank for the fiasco in Gaza that torments Israelis until today.

How could such great generals fail in this way?  Simply because the army is a hierarchical system which is totally antithetical to Knesset politics. Gantz was used to waking up in the morning knowing that he had a general staff, brigades and divisions at his beck and call.  By contrast Bibi is used to waking up to find that his coalition partner has walked out and left his government hanging by a thread. Gantz is used to being saluted and obeyed by his staff who know their place, whilst Bibi has to deal with heavyweights like Avigdor Liberman and artful dodgers like Arye Deri who will seize on any weakness to further their own agendas. Working 18-hour days on the knife-edge of coalition politics is what put the steel into the leader that now stands for his fourth term.

And it’s that same mettle that you see deployed against the corruption allegations brought against Netanyahu. Putting aside the pettiness of cigars, champagne and media favours, the most serious case being talked about is the submarine affair in which even the police and justice departments admit Bibi has absolutely nothing to answer for. But then we have seen so many of these political corruption cases make a big noise and then quietly fizzle out. Remember the 7-year persecution of Liberman which came to nothing?  Worst of all are the incessant police leaks which totally discredit the justice system.

And consider how soldier Sharon responded to his own scandals as compared to politician Bibi.  The Cyril Kern Affair and the Greek Island Affair both rocked the Sharon family, but the left-wing media gave them a pass – saying that they had to “protect Sharon like an etrog” so long as he would make good on the Gaza disengagement and evict 8,000 Jews from their homes. For Bibi Netanyahu it would seem the Lahav 433 police unit is chickenfeed compared to the cut and thrust of coalition politics and he has been saying consistently: bring them on!

In spite of all this, many are saying: we’re tired of Bibi – it’s time for a change already!  I would invite such people to look around the world and be careful what they wish for. Obama came offering ‘hope and change’ and what did he deliver?  In France they wanted an anti-Sarkozy and first got a doddering Hollande and now a feckless Macron. In Canada they threw out the great Stephen Harper and got landed with Trudeau, an airhead with false eyebrows.

Israel is truly privileged to have one of the world’s most formidable and experienced leaders at its helm and there’s nothing that counts for more in this world than experience. His stature has grown in Africa, Asia, South America and now amongst Arab leaders. Look at the body language in meetings with Putin on really tough issues affecting their vital national interests.  Moreover, Bibi has had to deal with three US presidents and, in the process, some very awkward Secretaries of State. 

He now has a unique relationship with President Trump, his first family and a dream team of Bolton, Pompeo, Greenblatt and Friedman.  If there’s anything worthy of protecting like an etrog it’s exactly this status quo.

So - come April 9^th  - voters should be very wary of throwing out Bibi with the bathwater.

Blue & White Fantasy

By all the brouhaha that’s blown up over the far-right Otzma Yehudit party, you’d have thought Bibi had invited them to join the Likud. AIPAC’s condemnation came as no surprise as they need to appeal to a broad American Jewish audience many of whom are Leftists whose faith-du-jour is political correctness and whose self-esteem is measured in likes and followers on social media. Thus anyone remotely connected with Meir Kahane is as toxic as ISIS.

But even as this issue erupted, Leftists were willing to give a pass to ISIS and allow their brides and expat fighters to return to America and Britain because they deserved a chance at rehabilitation. But for followers of Kahane it seems there is zero tolerance.

No, Bibi did not invite Otzma to join the Likud. He simply brokered a deal to allow Otzma votes to actually mean something in this election, rather than fall into the dustbin by failing to reach the qualifying threshold. The message is: if the Left can have a Hanin Zoabi, the Right is entitled to have the people of Otzma.

The difference between Left and Right is often associated with politics. But its pathology is much more fundamental. Leftists like to see the world as a cuddly fluffy place where everyone should be given the chance to get along. They have no concept of pure evil and will almost always seek root causes to explain evil acts rather than accept them as evil on face value. People on the Right accept that evil acts are committed or incited by evil people and if we haven’t already eliminated them, they can never be trusted anywhere near the things we hold dear.

Put simply, the fundamental difference between Left and Right is between fantasists and realists.

Yuppies in the Tel Aviv bubble will likely vote for Gantz and Lapid simply because they’re the ‘new thing’ and it’s cool to get aboard. That’s the zeitgeist that got geniuses like Trudeau and Macron elected.

The older Haaretz-readers in the bubble mostly believe that if we give the Arabs their state they’ll leave us alone. If it has to include the settlements and most of Jerusalem, so be it. At least they won’t want Tel Aviv.

This is the same fantasy that holds that if you throw enough meat at an attacking lion it will turn into a vegetarian.

Which brings me back to Kahane.

Granted, I don’t condone everything he did or said in his lifetime. But the one thing you cannot deny is that he was a visionary. He never stopped warning that there would never be peace with the Arabs. In the 30 years since his murder by an Arab assassin, there have been more than a dozen peace plans bandied about. Grand ideas of land swaps, tunnels between Ramallah and Gaza and of course Oslo which repackaged the PLO as a more user-friendly “PA” led by people in suits. Those plans either failed or caused more bloodshed than before.

Kahane understood that this was never a territorial dispute. It was about our very existence as Jews … and within ANY borders.

The people who will be voting for Otzma Yehudit are not necessarily Jewish terrorists. Instead they are Jewish realists. And unlike members of AIPAC, they are not watching this scenario from their armchairs in Long Island. They are surrounded on three sides by the mortal enemies of Israel, armed by Oslo and empowered by Leftists who see poor Palestinians as underdogs under brutal occupation, rather than the pure evil that unrepentantly butchered poor Ori Ansbacher two weeks ago. The same evil that Kahane warned us about 30 years ago.

And to this resident evil, Lapid and Gantz want to give a state?

The only way of preventing this madness is by making as many right-wing votes count to preserve Eretz Yisrael as there will be left-wing ballots in favour of more peace experiments or, worse still, votes that allow the unified Arab parties to hold the balance of power over our territory.

I end with a commandment from this very day’s Torah reading: “Beware lest you forge a covenant with the inhabitants of the land to which you come, lest it become a pitfall for you”.

A Parev Gantz

I've just watched candidate Benny Gantz's first foreign speech, at the Munich Security Conference.

You can see the video on the Ynet website HERE. (Scroll down the page)

Great soldier that he is, can you really see this man speaking to a packed US Congress?
It's quite painful to watch when you have to love the guy for his IDF service and leadership.
Too wooden, no passion and makes Olmert sound like Cicero.
Alas this is not prime ministerial material.
No wonder his handlers delayed his inaugural speech for so long.

It's not as if we've been dazzled by army heavyweights thrust into politics.
Rabin allowed himself to be dragged into the disaster of Oslo by the politically savvy Peres.
Barak fled South Lebanon and handed the keys to Hezbollah.
Then he offered to give away 97% of Judea and Samaria. Only by the grace of G-d did Arafat refuse.
Sharon evicted 8,000 Jews from Gaza and handed the keys to Hamas.
Both territories surrendered by these soldier-politicians are now lethal Iranian rocket bases.

Hopefully Gantz will have the opportunity to serve one day as defence minister.
But for prime minister, we need a man who speaks to the world with eloquence and passion.
That man is Bibi Netanyahu.
He had the guts to take the fight with Obama to the US Congress.
He got 26 standing ovations.

Can you see Gantz doing anything like that?

Did they vote FOR Bibi .. or AGAINST Obama ?

I have to admit I was very pessimistic throughout this election day.

With all the knives out for Netanyahu and foreign money busing thousands of Arab students into polling stations, it was like a Yom Kippur War on all fronts, with ballots instead of bullets.

Well, that's democracy - you may well say.

But not when foreign governments and viscerally anti-Jewish fatcats and NGOs are blatantly undermining that democracy with public or tax-exempt funds.

I'm glad that the Republican senate has launched its inquiry to track this money back to its shadowy sources with subpoena powers. Let these folks be exposed for what they are: vile anti-Semites who cannot stand to see Israel thriving as a bold, secure and independent Jewish state.

There's no doubt in my mind that many Israelis changed their vote as a protest against this egregious foreign interference in their most prized process as the region's only true democracy.

Whatever the coalition endgame and whatever issues you may have with Bibi Netanyahu  ... and I have a few of my own ... there can be no doubt that this man is a real fighter.  And in the world's most dangerous neighborhood boldness and steely resolve is more important than ever. 

Chazak !