Our enemies are smarter
Current Israeli government fails to read map, respond to new existential threats
Below the surface of the flotilla affair, we’ve seen the emergence of existential fear; and rightfully so. The feeling that the world hates us even more than we thought is certainly part of it. Yet it’s not the whole story. On top of it, there’s the sense that in such dangerous and hostile world, the Zionist ship is being swept away, while its captain and sailors are asleep.
Since becoming aware of politics, I do not remember such strong feeling of lack of leadership. I already had difficult feelings towards past Israeli governments, and thought that the policies led by some of them were dangerous. However, it appears that the problem here is greater. It’s not an issue of the government failing to implement my policies – it is unable to carry out its own policies either. And these are the people who have to contend with genuine existential threats.
This government had a policy of imposing a blockade on Gaza. In order to maintain it, the government sought to stop the Turkish flotilla. However, as it turned out, the raid ended up forcing Israel to ease the siege – just like several commentators predicted; one need not be a genius to look two steps ahead on the diplomatic chessboard.
The Turks, which sought to undermine the siege, led us into a checkmate, and we, without any brains or resourcefulness, blindly stepped into their transparent trap.
The trap was not the ambush prepared for Navy commandoes on board the ship. It was a diplomatic trap, and Barak and Netanyahu who sought to fool the Marmara’s passengers discovered that Hamas and Turkey in fact fooled Israel. Israel thought that it’s playing checkers, only to discover later that it was playing on a much greater board and just lost another game, without even realizing it was taking part in it.
Settler as foreign minister?
This is the scary thing: The Israeli government fails to read the map and grasp the new existential threats we face. The flotilla affair is merely a symptom. The problem is much broader.
How much “talent” does one need to lose the public opinion war vis-à-vis Islamic fundamentalism? How much political blindness does one need in order to maneuver Israel into the position or refusenik vis-à-vis the Palestinians, while they are the ones who hindered the partition of this land? What kind of lack of understanding of the political game is required in order to start off in a position where our rival is the refusenik, and shift the entire diplomatic theater to a point where we’re clashing with our allies over a few Jerusalem homes?
Finally, how much disorientation is needed in order to appoint a settler as Israel’s foreign minister, at a time when the whole world views the settlement enterprise as the ultimate proof that Israel intends to become a modern-day South Africa, with two classes of citizens? And these are the people who need to make decisions in the face of Iran’s nuclearization.
The problem is not that our enemies are stronger than us, but rather, that now they are smarter than us, or at least smarter than our government. Major General Uri Saguy recently said that he fears that Zionism will turn out to be a brief historical episode. I hope that this prediction would be proven false, yet when these are the people at the helm in a stormy sea, suddenly it doesn’t seem so unfounded.
