Settlements, corporatocracy, and where it all went wrong for Israel

As of today, 20 families control around 50% of the total market share in the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (as reported by the Bank of Israel annual report in 2010), nearly 40% of Israeli families can’t cover monthly expenses (as reported by the Central Bureau of Statistics in 2014), Israel spends around £160,000,000 annually on illegal settlements in the West Bank (as reported by the Central Bureau of Statistics in 2011), and by 2030, religious Jews are expected to become a majority among the Israeli population (according to a study from 2012 by Evgenia Byrstov and Arnon Soffer – “Israel: Demography 2012-2030: On the Way to a Religious State”).

The Israel we see today is very different from the state Theodor Herzl, the “father of Zionism” described in his book “The Jewish State” released in 1896: “Shall we end by having a theocracy? Indeed No. Faith unites us, knowledge gives us freedom. We shall therefore prevent any theocratic tendencies from coming to the fore on the part of our priesthood. We shall keep our priests within the confines of their temples in the same way as we shall keep our professional army within the confines of their barracks. Army and priesthood shall receive honours high as their valuable functions deserve. But they must not interfere in the administration of the State which confers distinction upon them, else they will conjure up difficulties without and within.”

How did Israel diverge from its original path, and where is it heading today?

When Israel was founded, Israel was a Socialist state. Up until 1977, the biggest party was the social-democratic Mapai, which ruled in a coalition with the socialist Mapam. In its first years the country experienced many challenges, like massive immigration and lack of natural resources. Thanks to a large public sector and state ownership of many industries, the state managed to provide housing for the new immigrant, and keep relatively low levels of unemployment. All of that changed in 1977 when the right wing party Likud came to power. The reason the Likud came to power was not because they offered a program that appealed to the people, but thanks to a populist campaign targeted at the Jewish immigrants from Arab states, which were suffering discrimination and arrogant attitudes from the Israeli establishment (which resulted in the Wadi Salib riots in 1959). The Likud cynically used the Mizrahi Jews to win the elections, against the interests of those same Mizrahi Jews who voted for them. Very quickly the Likud started a policy of privatization, resulting in many state owned factories that were providing jobs to the Israeli citizens and profits to the state of Israel moved to private hands. It’s not hard to guess what happened next, when the new owners of the factories fired a lot of the staff, and later totally moved the factories abroad where they can hire cheaper staff. The regions which suffered the most in Israel were the regions far from Tel Aviv and the Centre, and those were areas mostly settled by Mizrahi Jews and Arabs. Rising unemployment, poverty, and all of the other “blessings” brought by capitalism on the working class hit those regions.

Between then and now, as always happening with “free” market, reckless competition between many groups results in the “victory” of few which become monopolies. The way the Israeli economy operates today was brilliantly demonstrated in the documentary The Shakshuka System. Based on the case study of the Ofer family (one of those 20 families that rule Israel), the film demonstrates how government officials helped the Ofer family gain ownership over profitable state assets like the Dead Sea Works, for a cheap price, in order to get jobs afterwards in the Ofer Brothers Group. In other words, huge profits which could have went to the state, through corruption “somehow” found their way into the private pockets of the Ofer family. Due to the strong influence and control the Ofer family has in various Israeli media companies, no station originally wanted to air the film, and the creator, Mickey Rosenthal, received death threats. Only after the Association for Civil Rights in Israel contacted the Israel Broadcasting Authority, Channel One agreed to air the film (but not before the Ofer family got to make a “response” film, which was aired right after The Shakshuka System).

In order to maintain that system, known as Corporatocracy, the business tycoons need to find a “partner” (or “agent”) who will distract the people from what really is going on. That partner needs to get elected, and by that prevent those who want to put an end to that system from being elected instead. The traditional partners of the business tycoons are the nationalists, and together they form the package known as the political right wing. The more animosity the general population feels towards the “enemy” (whether it’s an ethnic group, a sexual minority, people on benefits, or a country), the easier the job is for the right wing to take power. The more the right wing feeds that animosity, the easier it is to maintain power. Due to the nature of the right wing, it’s hard for them to find a candidate who will look “clean” after a short Google search. However, what the right wing learned is that they still can get elected, if they manage to convince the general population that the other candidates are “traitors”, and that the “enemy” is an inhuman monster whose nature excludes the possibility of peace and coexistence.

Israel is in the middle of one of the most discussed conflicts in the world, the Arab-Israeli conflict. The tragedy of the conflict is that the main reason it is not resolved is because both sides are led by people who seem to be stirring up old wounds with the purpose of preventing a future resolution. Both the Likud on the Israeli side and the Hamas on the Palestinian side, are organizations who thrive on the conflict, and would not stay in power in the first place if not the conflict. In Israel the high living costs and unaffordable housing resulted in the 2011 Social Justice protests, while in Palestine the power-struggles between the Hamas and Fatah resulted in a de-facto Civil War in ongoing since 2006, with the radical Hamas forcing religious laws upon everyone living in areas under their control. Both the Likud and the Hamas are using the accusations against each other as an election strategy. Considering all the problems those parties are creating, if not the war, I doubt many Israelis would vote for the Likud, and I doubt the Palestinians would elect the Hamas.

Both sides are programmed to justify their own crimes by highlighting the crimes made by the other side, typical middle-eastern blood feud. A typical Israeli excuse for the 1948 Palestinian Exodus is that “Arabs started the 1948 Arab-Israeli war”. A typical Palestinian excuse for terror attacks targeting civilian population is “there is no such thing as innocent Israelis because they all pay taxes which fund settlements and occupation”. On both sides people were mentally “trained up” to automatically see the actions of their military forces as a “necessity”, without questioning their necessity or morality. Both sides were programmed to treat the other side as “temporary”, rather than a permanent fact. It’s very common to hear an Israeli claim “Palestinians are not a real nation because they didn’t exist before 1948”, or to hear a Palestinian say “Jews shouldn’t be here because they immigrated to Palestine in the 20th century”. Instead of focusing on the reality that both sides are not planning to evaporate, and working on a rational solution based on current facts. Both sides are trapped in theoretical labyrinths which have nothing to do with resolving the current situation.

As the occupying force, Israel naturally gets most of the criticism and blame for the situation (important to note though, the crimes of the Hamas against their own population are not getting enough attention). The Israeli propaganda overcame that challenge by creating false psychological associations in people’s heads. During World War II the Jewish nation was victim to one of the most horrifying genocides in human history, the Holocaust. The Israeli propaganda very quickly realized that this tragic event can be used to get out of the Israeli population a sense of fear and readiness to fight. Using psychological associations, the Israeli propaganda managed to convince the Israeli Jews that Palestine is Nazi Germany, and what the Nazi party (in this case, the Hamas) ruling Palestine wants is a full extermination of the Jewish race (and you have to admit, when it comes to the Hamas, it really is the case). Obviously when dealing with people who want your full extermination, there is not much to negotiate, and just like with killing Nazis, as far as the typical right-wing voting Israeli is concerned, every Palestinian is a “potential terrorist who rejoices in Jewish misery”. That’s why despite organizations like Amnesty and Breaking the Silence (Israeli soldiers reporting about war crimes) providing testimonies and proof of Israel using civilians as legitimate targets and using excessive force during the Gaza War, also known as Operation Cast Lead, 91% of the Israeli population approved of the operation (according to The Institute for National Security Studies). As far as the average Israeli is concerned, the operation was a “self-defense” operation to stop the Hamas from shooting rockets at Israel, while the Palestinians are guilty for electing the Hamas in the first place. The main fallacy in that argument is the failure of the average Israeli to understand that Palestinian violence against Israel will continue as long as the occupation continues, and that Israelis would do similar acts if Israel would be occupied by Palestine for such a long period of time.

It’s not just the Israeli fault there is no peace between Israel and the Arab countries. Even though it’s not taking away from the war crime of expelling Arabs from their homes in 1948, it was a conscious decision of the neighboring Arab states to not let those people in (unlike Israel did with the Jewish refugees from Arab states). Instead they kept them in refugee camps in horrid conditions in the 1948 reality and frame of mind. As for the Israeli paranoia about the Hamas, it is largely justified. Hamas is as radical Islam as it gets, supporting violence against non-Muslims and forcing Sharia law upon Palestinian occupation. However, one of the reasons the Hamas got elected in the first place was the election of Ariel Sharon and the Likud in Israel. In the early 90s the percentage of Israelis and Palestinians supporting peace negotiations was higher than 50%. However, a terror act from the Hamas helped the right win the elections in Israel, the actions of the right wing led to the second intifada and radicalization of the Palestinian population. This strengthened the position of the Right wing in Israel, which eventually led to the election of the Hamas in Palestine. People on both sides are too easily led by radical force and rather listen to radicals on their side rather the sane voices on the other side.

The main argument we hear from the Israeli politicians is that they want peace, but “there is no partner” on the Palestinian side. This excuse is enough for many Israelis to continue supporting the Israeli presence in Palestine, while not feeling like an occupying force that oppresses someone’s right for independence. The best proof this argument is false is the Geneva Initiative, also known as the Geneva Accord, published in 2003. For over 2 years independent Israelis and Palestinians were secretly negotiating a draft for a peace agreement between Israel and Palestine. Most of the people involved in the process were high profile politicians and long serving members of the establishment. On the Israeli side notable names included Yossi Beilin, former Israeli minister, and Avraham Burg, former chairman of the Jewish Agency for Israel and a Speaker of the Knesset. On the Palestinian side notable names included Yasser Abed Rabbo, former member of the Palestine Liberation Organization’s (PLO) Executive Committee, and Qadura Fares, a minister in the Palestinian Authority and member of the Palestinian Legislative Council for Fatah. While on the Palestinian side the President of the Palestinian National Authority, Yasser Arafat, openly supported the initiative, the Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon heavily criticized it. By implying the initiative was done “behind the back of the government and in coordination with the Palestinians”, Sharon was basically implying treason.

Another common argument used by the Israeli politicians is that “the other side will not respect the agreement”. That argument was already proven wrong with the Israel–Jordan peace treaty and the Egypt–Israel Peace Treaty. Right now the President of the State of Palestine is Mahmoud Abbas from the Fatah party. From his speeches and actions it looks like he is genuinely interested in peace, more than any other politician holding a key position in the Middle East today. On many occasions he said he wants Palestine and Israel to live side by side, and the impression he creates is that he wants to be remembered as the person who brought peace between the nations and gained Palestine its independence. Unfortunately, the person who is right now heading Israel, Benyamin Netanyahu, seems to do everything to avoid negotiations and a possible peace resolution. The scariest part is that Mahmoud Abbas is right now the only obstacle on the way of the Hamas to take over the whole of Palestine. When that happens, there really will not be a partner on the Palestinian side, and Netanyahu knows that, and is working towards it. For me, Likud and the Hamas represent two wings of the same movement, the movement of populists who make political gain from conflict and bloodshed.

In order to prevent themselves embarrassment when the Palestinian side agree to negotiate, the Israeli government came up with a new way of avoiding peace-talks, while still being able to blame it on the other side. The current Prime Minister of Israel, Benyamin Netanyahu, says Israel will not negotiate unless Palestine recognizes Israel as “a Jewish state”. The catch is, no one actually knows what “a Jewish state” means, even Jews can’t agree on that. Some say a Jewish state is a state ran by the Jewish religious law, some say “a Jewish state” is a state which is the home of the Jewish people as an ethnic group rather than a religious group, while some say it’s in fact a mixture of both. It’s a term with many definitions, interpretations and different potential realizations. If Israel is a Jewish state, what does it mean about non-Jews in Israel? What does it say about their status or rights in the State of Israel? Palestine will not agree to a definition which in theory might define Arabs living in Israel as Class-B citizens or “guests” in a Jewish state. The fact is no one else in human history ever raised such a ridiculous demand. Palestine does not ask to be recognized as “a Muslim state”, Ireland didn’t ask Britain to recognize it as “a Catholic state”, and the fact is such a definition is usually an internal business of a state in the first place. Do Israelis really believe they need Palestinian permission to define the character of Israel? To avoid criticism inside Israel for such a lame excuse to avoid negotiations, Netanyahu simply said that Palestine refusing Israel’s demand to recognize it as “a Jewish state” is equal to Palestine refusing to recognize the right of Jews to exist in Israel. Never mind the fact this explanation doesn’t make sense, it was enough for the Israeli population to stand behind that obscure demand.

One of the most controversial points in the Israeli politics today is the building of illegal settlements on the lands of the Palestinian autonomy. The whole idea of an occupying force trying to colonize an occupied territory with loyalists automatically raises a concern that the occupying force is not planning to leave or try and find peace with the locals. Any rational person would ask why would Israel invest so much money in a project which does nothing but create an obstacle on the way to finding a solution? The explanation lies in the base of the traditional alliance between right-wing parties and religious parties. As already discussed earlier in the article, the right wing thrives on ethnic tensions and multi-national conflicts. It distracts the population from the worrying process of Democracy being replaced by Corporatocracy, and it allows them to gain votes by populist speeches. Building settlements is the most effective way to provoke the local population and make sure the on-going conflict will continue. The religious parties, who always supported the idea, want to take those lands for a more disturbed reason. The religious parties believe that all of the lands which used to be a part of the Kingdom of Israel were given to Israel by god and the Jews “regaining” those lands will bring the Messiah sooner. Most of the Jewish settlers are people from a religious background and believe they are doing just that. I find it hard to imagine what can be more disturbing in politics than delusional religious fanatics trying to create a policy based on fairytales written thousands of years ago. Scary as it is, that’s exactly what is happening today in Israel. If every nation will claim ownership over every piece of land which ever was in the borders of their state/kingdom/empire, we might witness the deadliest war the world had ever known. The settlements are nothing more than a conscious attempt to make it harder to reach a peaceful resolution of the conflict, and a deadly crusade by the Jewish religious nationalists to rebuild the Kingdom of Israel.

Besides the settlements, another way to keep the Israeli population in constant fear and “readiness” for war is the mandatory army service. According to the Israeli law, every Israeli citizen or permanent resident who had reached the age of 18, men or women, has to serve 3 years in the Israeli army. Arabs and Orthodox Jews are exempt from the service. Since the early school years Israeli children are being literally brainwashed about the importance of military service and how Israel’s existence depends on “everyone joining the army”. The atmosphere created around it in Israel is one which makes military service look like a mandatory messianic act, almost a call from above. The army in many ways has the status of a religion in Israel. The equivalent is people who despite all scientific proof remain Christian and deny the Evolution. Even though a scientific fact, some people are too scared to part from the narrative they were brainwashed to believe gives meaning to their lives. In reality, a big part of young Israelis simply “waste” 3 years of their lives without a real purpose in the army. In 2004 after two years of work the Sheffer committee, a state committee discussing human resources in the Israeli army, concluded that around 50% of the IDF soldiers are “unnecessary”. The committee suggested cutting down military programs which are not focused on security (programs that were in the first place started to find something to do for all the “unnecessary” man power). It would make perfect financial and moral sense to cut down the unneeded manpower, stop wasting their time, and pay higher wages to those who stay. Unfortunately, for reasons which have nothing to do with common sense, nothing of that happened. The Israeli society is militarized to such an extent that the military background of politicians is often more important for Israeli citizens than their ideas or beliefs. The result is many of the people who hold high position in the Israeli army are close friends to people who hold high positions in the Israeli establishment. Cutting down manpower means cutting down generals, and the Israeli politicians will not allow their general friends to be made redundant. Besides, military service is part of the process of creating obedient citizens. The mandatory military service in Israel is a brainwashing mechanism, a system which engineers the Israeli citizen to see himself as a soldier of the system who will obey it and protect it, rather than a rational human being who wants to find out the truth and will challenge certain acts as right or wrong. An example for that regarding military service is how the general Israeli population reacted to an organization called “Breaking the Silence”. The organization was formed by former IDF soldiers, and focuses on publishing soldier testimonies about human rights violations by the IDF at the Palestinian territories. As a society which claims its army as “moral” and operates by the principle of “purity of the arms” (soldiers maintaining humanity even when performing military duty), I would expect Breaking the Silence to become national heroes after exposing truth the Israeli government was trying to hide from its citizens. Instead of causing a wave of anti-War protests, the organization was challenged by accusation of “treason” from government officials and the majority of the general population.

In many ways, Israel is a typical case. Except for the Nordic countries, it’s hard to think of a country in the western world which didn’t turn into a Corporatocracy. In most countries a small elite owns all the resources and rules all the manpower, while using the old tactic of hate speeches against minorities or other nations in order to distract people from what’s really happening. That system is reversible, if the population suddenly realizes what is really happening and takes action to change it (as happening all over Europe with protests against austerity and government cuts). However, in Israel it seems like there is a unique challenge which will likely cause Israel irreversible damage, the rapid growth of the Ultra-Orthodox population.

A huge problem in Israel, which in my opinion is the one that more than anything puts the future of Israel at risk, is the increasing percentage of religious people in Israel and the political power they have. Even though today only 9% of the Jewish population is Ultra-Orthodox and 10% are religious (according to the 2013 Israel Central Bureau of Statistics report), politically those groups have a disproportionally large influence on the way the Israel defines itself. To understand how it works, it is important to understand the way Israeli politics are operating. In the last decades, the right wing and left wing parties got a close amount of votes, and in many cases, they needed the religious parties support in order to form a coalition. During the coalition negotiations, the religious parties “blackmail” the state for control over certain areas while getting exemption from certain duties. The result is Israel is being held hostage by an extreme minority living according to fairytales and norms from 2000 years ago. According to a poll conducted by Ynet in 2013, 73% of the Israeli population support public transport on Saturdays. However, due to religious opposition there is no public transport in Israel on Saturday. Another example of religious control which results in violation of human rights, is the fact that a marriage in Israel can be performed only under the auspices of the religious community to which a couple belongs. The result is people who want/have to marry in a non-religious ceremony can do it only outside of Israel. Due to the faults in the Israeli political system, Ultra-Orthodox Jews have an unjustified amount of power to force laws on the whole Israeli population against their will. At the same time, the Ultra-Orthodox Jews are a growing burden on the Israeli economy. The Ultra-Orthodox school system is funded by the state, however, mandatory subjects like Math and Science are not being taught there due to the opposition of the Rabbis (less education means less likely to leave the Ultra-Orthodox community). According to a research conducted by the Taub centre, 65% of the Ultra-Orthodox men aged 35-54 don’t work (only three decades ago, the number stood at 21%). According to findings published by The Israel Central Bureau of Statistics in 2012, the growth rate of the Ultra-Orthodox community is 7 children per mother (as opposed to only 3 children per mother in secular families). It’s not hard to imagine how Israel will look like when it will be completely ran by religious fanatics. It’s enough to take a look in their neighborhoods and cities. The more time passes the more extreme the Ultra-Orthodox grow, and already today on buses ran by the state for the Ultra-Orthodox community women have to sit at the back of the bus, women’s faces are blurred out in newspapers, and in in religious places like Mea Shearim or Beit Shemesh, men and women are not even allowed to walk on the same side of the street.

Another problem which most political analysts are ignoring today regarding Israel is the ecological problem. As demonstrated in the book Ten Billion by Stephan Emmott, as the world resources are going down and consumption going up, the current world population growth rate is unsustainable. As shown by Daniel Orenstein in his 2004 article “Population Growth and Environmental Impact: Ideology and Academic Discourse in Israel”, due to political reasons, the Israeli establishment seems to turn a blind eye on the fact that Israel is overpopulated. Talking about family planning in Israel is a taboo. In every school, secular or religious, in every political debate about demographics, members of the Israeli establishment are stretching out the “importance” of Jews bringing as many children as possible in order to maintain the Jewish majority of Israel. As for the Arab growth rate, it is regarding in Israel as “the demographic threat”. Due to its small size and high density rate (the 34th highest in the world according to the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, with 40% of the population concentrated around Tel Aviv), Israel has extremely high pollution rates, and Israel’s water demand today are higher than the available conventional water resources. In other words, in order to secure a sustainable future, Israel ought to change its approach and try and slow down the current population growth rate. As demonstrated in the documentary The Shakshuka System, the high pollution rates coming from certain factories are a cause of cancer and other illnesses among the dense Israeli population. However, due to the strong connection between the business tycoons and the Israeli political establishment, the establishment makes everything in its hands to hide those facts from the general Israeli population.

The way it’s going, there will be nothing left in Israel that reflects what was perceived in the minds of people like Theodor Herzl, a secular democratic society. In an Israel where the vast majority of people are Ultra-Orthodox, it’s not hard to guess who will win the elections, what kind of laws will be passed, and how “unwanted elements” in the society will be treated (women, secular people, sexual minorities). It also a reality which is not financially sustainable. The vast majority of the Ultra-Orthodox doesn’t work, and when the Ultra-Orthodox will become a majority, the financial system will simply collapse and Israel will become a typical third-world dark theocracy. The Israel I want to see is a secular Israel where religion and state are separated, an Israel which signs peace agreements with its neighbors (and don’t just say “there is no partner”), and an Israel where the financial system is ran for the people and not for corporations. Unfortunately, Israel will either “peacefully” turn into a dark discriminating theocracy, or will fall into a civil war between the secular and religious populations. The mind of the average Israeli is wrapped in so many layers of fear, propaganda and ignorance, it’s hard to believe someone will wake up before it’s too late. Israelis developed a defensive reaction to criticism against the Israeli policy and take it personally, especially when coming from foreigners. A typical Israeli response would be “why does everyone talk about Israel so much? What about other conflicts worldwide?” Even though it’s partly true and it doesn’t make any sense that conflicts like the Darfur Genocide, Turkish occupation of Kurdistan and Azerbaijani aggression against Nagorno-Karabakh get less attention than the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. However, it doesn’t mean that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict gets too much attention; it just means that other conflicts get too little attention.