Source: Zman Yisrael (Israel Time)
By Pinhas Inbari
In the glorious history of the culture of fakes and spin, the mega-spin of “Qatar stole the elections” surpasses them all. It goes a long way toward explaining why the outgoing government fought so fiercely against Israeli culture and the free media, and why the decline of Israeli pupils in reading-comprehension tests was regarded by us as a failure – and by the government as an achievement.
A culture of spin and fakes cannot take root among an educated people that understands what is placed before it. Add to this the deepening of public fears of dangers – real, inflated and imagined – in order to amplify the effect of the fake.
A Reading Comprehension Test
So how should this spin be read according to the rules of reading comprehension? Qatar – a financial superpower without equal, which buys governments, universities and every Islamist terror movement in the world – would fund fuel vouchers to drive voters around the Negev?
A culture of spin and fakes cannot take root among an educated people that understands what is placed before it. Add to this the deepening of public fears of dangers – real, inflated and imagined – in order to amplify the effect of the fake.
Among a people capable of reading comprehension, such a thing would pass only as a joke; here, entire panels are convened to discuss it. And all this for what? So that Qatar can bring down a government in which it supposedly has a foothold.
One must attribute an exceptionally low level of intelligence to the public to push through a mega-fake like this – and judging by the ease with which this mega-fake has been absorbed by the public, perhaps we really are not as wise and discerning a people as we like to think.
But why speculate? Over the weekend it was reported that the information was passed to the police by the Prime Minister’s Office itself. From Qatargate to Qatar-spin. It would come as no surprise if it turned out that those in the Office suspected of ties with Qatar sought to shift suspicion onto the Arabs – both for personal reasons and to confirm the earlier spin that the Arabs are “Muslim Brotherhood.”
Ordinary Spin and Mega-Spin
An “ordinary” spin has a well-defined goal: to divert public discussion from a subject that is uncomfortable for the government to another, more inflammatory one that suits it. A mega-spin has additional goals: to thwart moves that threaten the government before they reach their destination.
And in our concrete case – to prevent the convening of the newly elected Knesset and to force new elections while excluding the Arab voter.
So how should this spin be read according to the rules of reading comprehension? Qatar – a financial superpower without equal, which buys governments, universities and every Islamist terror movement in the world – would fund fuel vouchers to drive voters around the Negev?
An Opposition Without Fire
Our great problem is that the opposition – to which the Arab voter handed power – lacks the fire in its eyes to take it, because the Prime Minister’s Office’s mega-spin works well on it too.
It would have been expected to sweep this spin off the table immediately, rather than fall into line with it; to declare firmly that precisely because of the new mega-spin, it stands by the Arab voter and accepts his democratic decision without question.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cannot accept the election results, because for him they may mean not the opposition benches but prison. It is to be expected that even if this mega-spin evaporates, Netanyahu will deny the findings that refuted it and will go on inflating it.
Over the weekend he met with Itamar Ben Gvir, and there is reason to fear what the two agreed upon regarding their next moves.
And Netanyahu’s situation is even worse: not only has he lost his parliamentary majority, he has no bloc at all. US President Donald Trump, who supported him, has denied him the option of forming a government with Ben Gvir, and appears close to doing the same with Bezalel Smotrich – and the leader who, by his own declarations, “does not surrender” will certainly surrender. It is not even certain that the Haredim, apart from Aryeh Deri, will recommend him to the President.
Netanyahu cannot accept the election results, because for him they may mean not the opposition benches but prison. It is to be expected that even if this mega-spin evaporates, Netanyahu will deny the findings that refuted it and will go on inflating it.
President Trump and President Isaac Herzog are already working to establish a unity government. The mega-spin that taints the Arab vote obliges the opposition to announce unequivocally that, under these conditions, it is determined not to sit with lying partners and engineers of perception – not to mention worse things.
Our tragedy is that it is doubtful such a self-evident statement will be made, because despite everything and after everything, the one who dictates Israeli discourse is Netanyahu. The feeble opposition fails to put forward a competing discourse – a discourse of truth rather than lies, of real reality rather than an invented one.
The mega-spin has another hidden aim – to sow division and quarrels within the change camp. The very fact that the bloc is hesitating is already a gain for Netanyahu. In the end they will lose both their dignity and power, and at best will become Benny Gantz 2 – if not worse.
But it is worth remaining optimistic – in the end, the opposition will be dragged into forming a government against its will, because there is no other option. Ra’am, with Mansour Abbas, and Yoav Segalovitz will provide the basis for a minority government, and the Joint List will support it from outside.
So, facing the danger that Trump will dictate to Israel the composition of its next government, what should Gadi Eisenkot do? I would suggest that he thank Trump for his support of Israel and pledge that, when he heads the government, he will advance all of Trump’s moves to change the face of the Middle East – moves that Netanyahu has thwarted one after another.
In doing so, Eisenkot would foil the initiatives to circumvent the election results, establish himself here and now as the incoming prime minister, and also cement Israel’s standing as a reliable ally of the United States.
Eisenkot can thank Trump for his support of Israel and pledge to advance his moves to change the Middle East that Netanyahu thwarted. In doing so he would foil the initiatives to circumvent the election results, establish himself as prime minister, and cement his standing as a reliable US ally.
A Legislative Blitz – or Hesitation
According to reports, the opposition intends to launch a legislative blitz, beginning with the removal of the Speaker of the “half-Knesset,” Amir Ohana. But having fallen into line with the spins of the Prime Minister’s Office, there is reason to fear that it will hesitate and fail to seize power by the horns, as Netanyahu would do without a moment’s hesitation.
In this context, it is worth recalling the words of Ra’am leader Mansour Abbas, who said he has already been approached by Netanyahu. In light of what look like special ties between Yariv Levin and the Arab lists, one cannot rule out a back channel of contacts at the end of which Ra’am would complete the Likud’s 61 seats to form a government.
I raise this not because I believe it will happen, but to illustrate Netanyahu’s hunger for power – a hunger that the change bloc, devoid of change, may lack.
Herzog Pieces the Shreds Back Together
And worst of all: disqualifying the Arab vote on the basis of a “Zionist consensus” places Zionism on a racist foundation. President Herzog’s enlistment in this narrative closes a circle – but in the bad sense of the word. His father, Chaim Herzog, tore to shreds, from the UN podium, the resolution that equated Zionism with racism. President Isaac Herzog is taking the shreds of that infamous resolution and piecing them back together.
Disqualifying the Arab vote on the basis of a “Zionist consensus” places Zionism on a racist foundation. President Isaac Herzog is taking the shreds of the infamous “Zionism is racism” resolution that his father, President Chaim Herzog, tore up at the UN – and piecing them back together.
If this disqualification does indeed come to pass – what a disgrace.
Pinhas Inbari is a senior Middle East researcher, journalist, author, screenwriter and poet. He wrote the entries on the Palestinians in the New Hebrew Encyclopedia and served for many years as a researcher at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs. He has written non-fiction books on the Palestinian problem, as well as a linguistics book on the roots of the Hebrew language, Sipur Shoresh (The Story of a Root). The novels he co-wrote with his wife, Aviva, are Al Gav Sufa (On the Back of a Storm) – about the challenges facing the Christian communities of the Western Galilee during the British Mandate in the face of radical Islam, and the status of women – and Shomer HaShe’ol (Guardian of Sheol), which deals with Israeli corruption.
