What Israel’s Shakeup Won’t Mean
By Jonathan S. Tobin
Has Israel just chosen to elevate a warmonger who will set the region aflame? That’s the kind of apocalyptic rhetoric being heard from some of the usual precincts on Israel’s left after Prime Minister Netanyahu chose Avigdor Lieberman to be the country’s new minister of defense. A rough-edged immigrant from the former Soviet Union, Lieberman is viewed by most of Israel’s elite — on the right as well as the left — as something of an extremist thug, and the resulting cries of dismay and alarm about his elevation rang out loud and clear across the political spectrum. The question now for Israel’s overseas friends is how seriously to take the attacks on Lieberman and the laments for the political demise for Moshe Yaalon, the man he is replacing. Should Israelis really be heading to their bomb shelters and will their country’s image take a hit as a result of the Cabinet shakeup?
It should first be said that Yaalon’s departure from the government is a loss for Israel. Though his political skills were never equal to his intellect or his security expertise, Yaalon was one of his country’s most distinguished soldiers and his tenure at the Ministry of Defense was widely considered to be successful in most respects. But in a parliamentary democracy, such a post is always more a matter of politics than technocratic skill. Having run afoul of the prime minister for backing some talkative generals who seemed to be questioning the government’s policies, he made himself expendable once a new coalition alignment became possible. His talk of Israel’s moral decline earned him applause in certain parts of the Israeli media and abroad, but it did not sit well with the prime minister or with other members of Likud where he never felt entirely welcome. While this probably won’t be the last we’ll hear of him, whether he forms his own party or joins one of the other smaller groups in the Knesset, he has become yet another entry in the long list of Likud politicians that thought they could challenge Netanyahu and wound up having to find a new political home.
But what of Lieberman? Is he as bad as the op-ed columnists have been claiming and will he recklessly involve Israel in new conflicts while inflaming the old ones? The answer is that while he will not mesh easily with the defense establishment, he is not likely to make any big mistakes or behave rashly.
Lieberman is well known for making incendiary statements about the Palestinians and supporting the death penalty for terrorists. In particular, he was a strident critic of Netanyahu and Yaalon’s conduct of the 2014 Gaza War, which he felt was mistaken because the counter-attack against the terrorist state was too restrained and in the end left Hamas in power. But now that he’s one of those in the drivers’ seat, no one should expect him to make good on his threats to take them out. Lieberman is a tough talker, but his long tenure in various Cabinet posts over the last 15 years under Ariel Sharon, Ehud Olmert, and Netanyahu shows him to be pragmatic and actually as cautious as the current prime minister. Nor is this the first time he has been handed a post with great responsibility. It should be remembered that he served as foreign minister for five years under Netanyahu and managed not to start any wars there.
But by the same token, having Lieberman back in the spotlight isn’t going to bolster Israel’s image. For a good profile of his early career and his ability to represent the interests of fellow former Russians, read this profile in COMMENTARY from 2011 by Seth Mandel. He is widely derided in Israel as a Putinesque figure and was long dogged by charges of corruption though he was acquitted in 2013. A settler, Lieberman has been branded a racist because of his plan to trade towns were Israeli Arabs live with a proposed Palestinian state in exchange for settlements. But since even peace advocates have spoken of land swaps as part of an eventual peace treaty, it’s hard to see how his idea is much different from that. Nor, despite the heated rhetoric he uses, are his positions about settlements or the peace process very different from that of Yaalon. After all, it was Yaalon who blasted Secretary of State John Kerry for having an “obsessive, messianic” approach to negotiations with the Palestinians. Nevertheless, having Lieberman back in a prominent position will feed the narrative about Israel being governed by right-wing extremists.
Lieberman’s biggest problem is whether he’s up to the job of running Israel’s military. Unlike most defense ministers who are former generals, Lieberman has no particular security expertise. The last time the country had a person in that post with a similarly thin military resume — Labor’s Amir Peretz — was a cautionary tale. Peretz presided over disastrous 2006 Lebanon War and is best remembered for a picture in which he was caught looking through binoculars with the caps on the lenses. As Mandel pointed out, some of the ridicule of Peretz was ethnic in nature because he was from Morocco and Lieberman has experienced some of the same treatment because he is Russian, something that feeds the resentment of his fellow immigrants that vote for Yisrael Beiteinu. But while Netanyahu could limit Lieberman’s influence while he was at the foreign ministry by conducting some of the country’s diplomacy personally or via ambassadors to the U.S. that report to him, Lieberman will be on his own at the defense ministry. The new minister will likely crack down on generals making political speeches — something that Yaalon should have done — but the question is how he will perform if Hamas starts another war. Lieberman has long wanted the defense post to prove his security bona fides. If he is put to the test and found wanting, however, he’ll regret getting his wish.
The dynamic between Lieberman and Netanyahu will also be worth watch watching. Though Lieberman started out in politics by working for Netanyahu and they have served together for many years, they are well known to dislike each other intensely. In essence by swapping Lieberman for Yaalon, as the Times of Israel noted, he has made his worst enemy his ally and his ally his worst enemy. How that is going to work out in the long run is anybody’s guess, but both the prime minister and his new defense minister are, above all, hard-headed politicians who are concerned with keeping themselves in power. Count on the two of them coexisting fairly peacefully until the knives come out for the next election.
There are other aspects to the shakeup that will also have repercussions. Yaalon’s resignation brings the next person on the Likud list into the Knesset. It happens to be Yehuda Glick, an activist for allowing Jewish prayer on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount. While the international press thinks Lieberman is the loose canon, Glick’s presence in parliament may be more of a headache for Netanyahu than the new defense minister.
Where does this leave Israel and its relations with the United States as well as the prospects for peace? Despite the apocalyptic rhetoric from the left about Lieberman’s extremism and the sniping from the right about his qualifications for his new post, the Cabinet shakeup changes nothing about Israel’s strategic position. Peace wasn’t just around the corner even if Netanyahu had made a deal with Herzog. Nor will a new defense minister change anything about the ongoing standoff with Hamas in Gaza. Similarly, the strategic relationship with the United States hinges more on the question of who is running things in Washington than who is running the defense ministry in Tel Aviv. If Lieberman could have relatively cordial relations with Kerry, he will manage just fine with Secretary of Defense Ash Carter. For all of the sound and fury about the Cabinet shuffle, nothing important has changed which is, of course, both good and bad news for the Jewish state.
Commentary
May 20, 2016
Has Israel just chosen to elevate a warmonger who will set the region aflame? That’s the kind of apocalyptic rhetoric being heard from some of the usual precincts on Israel’s left after Prime Minister Netanyahu chose Avigdor Lieberman to be the country’s new minister of defense. A rough-edged immigrant from the former Soviet Union, Lieberman is viewed by most of Israel’s elite — on the right as well as the left — as something of an extremist thug, and the resulting cries of dismay and alarm about his elevation rang out loud and clear across the political spectrum. The question now for Israel’s overseas friends is how seriously to take the attacks on Lieberman and the laments for the political demise for Moshe Yaalon, the man he is replacing. Should Israelis really be heading to their bomb shelters and will their country’s image take a hit as a result of the Cabinet shakeup?
It should first be said that Yaalon’s departure from the government is a loss for Israel. Though his political skills were never equal to his intellect or his security expertise, Yaalon was one of his country’s most distinguished soldiers and his tenure at the Ministry of Defense was widely considered to be successful in most respects. But in a parliamentary democracy, such a post is always more a matter of politics than technocratic skill. Having run afoul of the prime minister for backing some talkative generals who seemed to be questioning the government’s policies, he made himself expendable once a new coalition alignment became possible. His talk of Israel’s moral decline earned him applause in certain parts of the Israeli media and abroad, but it did not sit well with the prime minister or with other members of Likud where he never felt entirely welcome. While this probably won’t be the last we’ll hear of him, whether he forms his own party or joins one of the other smaller groups in the Knesset, he has become yet another entry in the long list of Likud politicians that thought they could challenge Netanyahu and wound up having to find a new political home.
But what of Lieberman? Is he as bad as the op-ed columnists have been claiming and will he recklessly involve Israel in new conflicts while inflaming the old ones? The answer is that while he will not mesh easily with the defense establishment, he is not likely to make any big mistakes or behave rashly.
Lieberman is well known for making incendiary statements about the Palestinians and supporting the death penalty for terrorists. In particular, he was a strident critic of Netanyahu and Yaalon’s conduct of the 2014 Gaza War, which he felt was mistaken because the counter-attack against the terrorist state was too restrained and in the end left Hamas in power. But now that he’s one of those in the drivers’ seat, no one should expect him to make good on his threats to take them out. Lieberman is a tough talker, but his long tenure in various Cabinet posts over the last 15 years under Ariel Sharon, Ehud Olmert, and Netanyahu shows him to be pragmatic and actually as cautious as the current prime minister. Nor is this the first time he has been handed a post with great responsibility. It should be remembered that he served as foreign minister for five years under Netanyahu and managed not to start any wars there.
But by the same token, having Lieberman back in the spotlight isn’t going to bolster Israel’s image. For a good profile of his early career and his ability to represent the interests of fellow former Russians, read this profile in COMMENTARY from 2011 by Seth Mandel. He is widely derided in Israel as a Putinesque figure and was long dogged by charges of corruption though he was acquitted in 2013. A settler, Lieberman has been branded a racist because of his plan to trade towns were Israeli Arabs live with a proposed Palestinian state in exchange for settlements. But since even peace advocates have spoken of land swaps as part of an eventual peace treaty, it’s hard to see how his idea is much different from that. Nor, despite the heated rhetoric he uses, are his positions about settlements or the peace process very different from that of Yaalon. After all, it was Yaalon who blasted Secretary of State John Kerry for having an “obsessive, messianic” approach to negotiations with the Palestinians. Nevertheless, having Lieberman back in a prominent position will feed the narrative about Israel being governed by right-wing extremists.
Lieberman’s biggest problem is whether he’s up to the job of running Israel’s military. Unlike most defense ministers who are former generals, Lieberman has no particular security expertise. The last time the country had a person in that post with a similarly thin military resume — Labor’s Amir Peretz — was a cautionary tale. Peretz presided over disastrous 2006 Lebanon War and is best remembered for a picture in which he was caught looking through binoculars with the caps on the lenses. As Mandel pointed out, some of the ridicule of Peretz was ethnic in nature because he was from Morocco and Lieberman has experienced some of the same treatment because he is Russian, something that feeds the resentment of his fellow immigrants that vote for Yisrael Beiteinu. But while Netanyahu could limit Lieberman’s influence while he was at the foreign ministry by conducting some of the country’s diplomacy personally or via ambassadors to the U.S. that report to him, Lieberman will be on his own at the defense ministry. The new minister will likely crack down on generals making political speeches — something that Yaalon should have done — but the question is how he will perform if Hamas starts another war. Lieberman has long wanted the defense post to prove his security bona fides. If he is put to the test and found wanting, however, he’ll regret getting his wish.
The dynamic between Lieberman and Netanyahu will also be worth watch watching. Though Lieberman started out in politics by working for Netanyahu and they have served together for many years, they are well known to dislike each other intensely. In essence by swapping Lieberman for Yaalon, as the Times of Israel noted, he has made his worst enemy his ally and his ally his worst enemy. How that is going to work out in the long run is anybody’s guess, but both the prime minister and his new defense minister are, above all, hard-headed politicians who are concerned with keeping themselves in power. Count on the two of them coexisting fairly peacefully until the knives come out for the next election.
There are other aspects to the shakeup that will also have repercussions. Yaalon’s resignation brings the next person on the Likud list into the Knesset. It happens to be Yehuda Glick, an activist for allowing Jewish prayer on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount. While the international press thinks Lieberman is the loose canon, Glick’s presence in parliament may be more of a headache for Netanyahu than the new defense minister.
Where does this leave Israel and its relations with the United States as well as the prospects for peace? Despite the apocalyptic rhetoric from the left about Lieberman’s extremism and the sniping from the right about his qualifications for his new post, the Cabinet shakeup changes nothing about Israel’s strategic position. Peace wasn’t just around the corner even if Netanyahu had made a deal with Herzog. Nor will a new defense minister change anything about the ongoing standoff with Hamas in Gaza. Similarly, the strategic relationship with the United States hinges more on the question of who is running things in Washington than who is running the defense ministry in Tel Aviv. If Lieberman could have relatively cordial relations with Kerry, he will manage just fine with Secretary of Defense Ash Carter. For all of the sound and fury about the Cabinet shuffle, nothing important has changed which is, of course, both good and bad news for the Jewish state.
Article Link to Commentary:
0 Response to "What Israel’s Shakeup Won’t Mean"
Post a Comment