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Slow down, we're in a hurry
Neither Netanyahu nor Barak understand why public rejects them
After delivering a warm, off-the-cuff speech at a farewell reception last week for outgoing Defense Ministry Director Amos Yaron, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon veered from his intended course and took a seat next to former Prime Minister Ehud Barak.
At the same time, presumably, Benjamin Netanyahu was watching from Jerusalem. And even if neither would ever admit it, both were certainly asking themselves the same question generations of politicians, psychologists and campaign managers have been asking: "What is it about this guy, Sharon?"
Barak and Netanyahu both mistakenly believe that their policies – political, economic, and security – caused Israeli voters to chuck them out of office in 1999 and 1996, respectively.
Barak says over and over that he was responsible for "revealing Arafat's true face," whereas Bibi repeats his song like a mantra: "The Palestinians gave nothing, so they'll get nothing from me."
Load of crap
What a load of crap. Long before Netanyahu, in 1992, it was proven that most Israelis are prepared to give up far more than their leaders. On Sharon's watch, terror reached heights we have never known, but he was reelected, and even conducted negotiations under fire.
Then, in his election campaign he spoke of "painful compromises."
Barak and Netanyahu would both reject the following statement, but it is true nonetheless: They fell, or fell apart, because of their behavior, because of all the zigzags, because of their personal behavior, because they tried to please all the people all the time, because put simply, they were just untrustworthy.
As the late Ezer Weizmann put it, they are both "meteorologists": "Every morning they go outside, lick their fingers and check the direction of the wind. Whichever way it's blowing, that's the way they'll go," he said.
The latest polls suggest drinking the morning coffee with the left hand? No worries. Public wants it downed in one sip? Down the hatch.
No self control, no middle ground
Barak and Netanyahu, together and separately, appear to have nothing on their minds except the prime minister's chair. They can't control themselves: Every morning they get up to fight, and they simply must beat everyone at everything, all the time.
Neither has any concept of a middle ground, of give-and-take, of compromise. It's all or nothing. For Barak its general election; for Bibi, it's the Likud Central Committee.
Sharon, like Rabin before him, dreamt of becoming prime minister, but he never showed it (outside his circle of friends.) The opposite, he has sounded like Rabin himself: "For me, becoming prime minister is an option, not an obsession."
Shimon Peres suffered from this phenomenon for a long time: For years he charged towards the prime minister's chair. Now mellowed, he still wants the top job, but not at all costs.
Barak and Netanyahu both speak and act like marathon runners who open a long campaign with a 100-meter sprint. Therefore, at this point at least (this is an important point. After all, this is a crazy country…) neither Barak nor Netanyahu will return to the Prime Minister's Office in the foreseeable future.
To say the least, most people here don't like either of them, even if they more-or-less agree with their policies (assuming those policies haven't changed since yesterday.)
The first president of the African country Ivory Coast, Felix Houphouet-Boigny, once said his country was "going slowly because we are in a rush."
Eight words of very sage advice.
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