An all-Israeli tale

Because if Katsav is a grim tale of acts undertaken forcefully behind closed doors, a sort of "Mystic River" with a dark ending from Client Eastwood, Ramon is the all-Israeli story, like the neighbor's son who screwed up and got screwed. It's a story where we don't see two angry camps pitted against each other, but rather, many women who do not fully agree with the verdict and men who aren't sure either.

I do not intend to downplay the severity of the affair, but rather, wonder about its weight and why it stimulates so many conversations among us and within us.

It appears that this Haim Ramon guy is part of the Israeli that is all of us, a friendly guy who favors pulverizing the enemy but also peace, the man who dismantled the disliked Histadrut labor union federation, well-spoken and arrogant, a real Jaffa resident, the careless and warm all-Israeli character, who sometimes invades the privacy of others, a big talker and an eternal flirt who always has a pretty woman by his side but still continues to look around.

On the continuum between serial rapist Benny Sela and Bill Clinton, the president with the cigar and Monica, Ramon is much more Bill than Benny.

Ramon's story is completely different than the Katsav affair, because it's a tale taken from everyday life. It was about a kiss, it wasn't done in the dark but rather, in daylight, and not in a closed-door office. It didn't leave one party crying in pain while the other is moaning in forbidden pleasure. Therefore, it is vaguer, reminiscent of the actions of all of us, and raises more questions.

It is also more like the Clinton affair because the weight of what happened following the hasty, documented act is much greater than the act itself. It's more of a story about getting mixed up in small, needless lies that follow irresponsible conduct. More of a cover-up that aimed to hide something that could have been finished off easily, not something dark buried in the heart of a silent family, with the wife silently weeping, the son bravely defending his father and writing a Kafka-like story, and the father describing himself as a Dreyfus-like victim and not expressing regret for his sins for a moment.

A twilight zone

The Ramon tale is also not a story of a horny old man who desired the fresh flesh of a young girl, but rather, a tale of an aggressive male who has been loved by many women, and who failed in grasping reality through an uncontrollable reflex and activated something that lies between careless charm and the use of authority for a forbidden invasion, before he stopped when he saw there was no response.

This is the kind of case that happens often in this confused era where the balance of power between men and women is shifting, and a good thing it is, and everything is still in the phase of being formulated and clarified.

What seemed even to the kissed woman as a sort of crude surprise was interpreted by her several hours later as a blatant violation of the rules, and everything was turned upside down and became a criminal investigation, and ended up at court because of the twilight zone where it took place and in light of the media frenzy and other matters that are not always relevant.

And the kissing man, Haim, is so Israeli even at the stage where he invades the mouth of a strange woman on the way to a vote in favor of invading a neighboring country. He is no gentleman, and even when he figures out his mistake he isn't quick to offer roses as a way of apologizing, but rather, gets entangled in the affair and insults the one who only a week ago he liked so much. And there, she turns into an enemy that must be subjected to an all-out war that will end in disgrace, just like the war he voted in favor of at the government session following the kiss ended in disgrace.

And so, on the same ticket we got both a fable about our place and also the 2007 version of an Israeli soap opera. It's pathetic yet accurate, and this is perhaps why it's so widely discussed. It's so shaken up, oscillating between feminists who view it as victory over men and the sense of a Pyrrhic victory and sorrow and shame. A sort of Haim affair. So much us.

It's a tale that hasn't reached its end yet, and according to soap opera rules may still change entirely when the disgrace gives rise to partial cleansing and an apology, and so forth.