Looking Beyond Olmert

Behind his portly frame and seemingly unsophisticated exterior, Binyamin (Fuad) Ben-Eliezer, Minister of Infrastructure and Ehud Barak’s closest political ally, possesses one of Israel’s most cunning political minds. Fuad has been a diehard opponent of new elections: As of now, Labor looks like shedding a quarter of its seats in the Knesset, and if that happens the Labor party will hand Barak his head. Yesterday Fuad told a meeting of the Labor Party faithful, “make no mistake—we’re heading for elections.”

If even Fuad believes it’s elections, then it’s elections. Time to look beyond Olmert, beyond Kadima. I cannot do so without a strong sense of disappointment at lost opportunities. It’s not just Olmert who’s wasted two years of Israel’s time but ourselves as well, the author of this blog and all who share concern for a Jewish Israel. Israel is going to the polls, but with no real choices other than the discounted ones of yesteryear.

Something happened in the summer of 2006: The Israeli public lost its faith in the political shibboleths it has followed since Yitzhak Rabin was elected in 1992. People want peace but no longer believe in it. They oppose territorial withdrawals and think they’re bad news, with or without a piece of paper saying “treaty” on it. They have lost faith in all their public institutions: Government, politicians, courts, army, even the media, whom they despise even as they consume them compulsively. Deep beneath the surface is rising concern about the fate of the Jewish state.

The governing culture, whose various representatives are the chief candidates in the forthcoming elections, is losing its self-confidence. It is still strong, still able to defend its position, but it is in decline.

At the same time, the public declares that it feels more Jewish and more “right wing.” It is hard to determine exactly what these terms mean to those who use them. But as is often the case with social trends, the process is clearer than the particular point we have reached in it at the present or any other time.

This would be an opportune time for an alternative political leadership to present itself to the public with an alternative public agenda and, more important, an alternative cultural and ethical narrative to justify it. It’s no secret what these are:

We need to preserve the Jewish state, because it’s under mortal threat from enemies without and within.
To do that, we need first and foremost to be convinced of the justice of a Jewish state and of the policies needed to promote its welfare. That means we need to take traditional Jewish values seriously and make them the foundation of our public policy.
We need new policies in specific areas: A much more decisive foreign and military policy; large new incentives to encourage Palestinian emigration; new legal and media institutions; and a more open, competitive educational system which, without forcing anything on anyone, facilitates (=funds) access for all to the traditional Jewish values on which Israeli society must now be reconstructed.

An alternative political leadership broadcasting this message in a way accessible to the entire Israeli public would cast a giant shadow over Israeli society. It would set the agenda of this election campaign. It wouldn’t necessarily win this time, but it would set the terms of debate. And having once done so, its eventual victory, in the next elections or the ones after that, would be assured.

Unfortunately, it isn’t about to happen. We aren’t ready. We haven’t put forth the leaders and we haven’t put together the message. But we could, if we put our minds and our money to it. I think I know something of what we should be doing and, G-d willing, will write about more in the weeks ahead.