Kevin McCarthy’s embrace of Benjamin Netanyahu ignored his war on Israeli democracy

JERUSALEM — When Kevin McCarthy visited Israel Monday, he aligned himself with a would-be autocrat who is assaulting Israel’s democracy and splitting the country apart.

Not only did the House speaker offer to host Benjamin Netanyahu in Congress, a slap at President Joe Biden who has rightly delayed a White House invitation to the Israeli prime minister because of his stunningly undemocratic actions.

Worse, McCarthy ignored the unprecedented grassroots battle waged for the past 17 weeks by hundreds of thousands of Israelis to prevent Netanyahu from gutting the Supreme Court — and empowering violent ultraradical nationalists and religious zealots.

Like Donald Trump, Netanyahu has embraced dangerous allies and attacked the courts in hopes of avoiding conviction on corruption charges. Like Trump, he is willing to ally with messianic believers and thugs, if it will help him retain power.

True, with a population of 9.3 million people, Israel is a much smaller and differently structured society than ours. Yet American democrats (with a small “d”) should watch how Israeli civil society is organizing to fight for democratic values. Israelis are facing a more advanced stage of the fight to preserve democracy than we have reached here.

“Finally, the thinking people are making their voice heard,” I was told by Shikma Bressler, a 42-year-old highly respected particle physicist at the Weizmann Institute of Science who has become the face — and frequent moderator — of Tel Aviv’s massive Saturday night demonstrations. We were standing inside a deserted mall as she prepared to go out to the stage to take the mike and lead the chant for “De-mo-crat-ya!” (democracy in Hebrew).

She had never been an activist until 2020, when she was shocked that Netanyahu used COVID-19 as an excuse to shut down Israeli courts just before his first trial for corruption. She and her brothers rallied a convoy of cars waving black flags — a signal of danger to democracy — and a video of their drive to the Knesset went viral.

When, after his reelection last year, Netanyahu suddenly sprung his “judicial reform” plan to gut the Supreme Court, Bressler decided “the point of no return had been crossed.”

As she explained, in the Israeli system — which has a symbolic president, only one house of parliament, and no constitution — the Supreme Court serves as the only real check on the governing party or coalition. Netanyahu’s plan would gut the court’s oversight role, giving his coalition unlimited power. And that coalition includes radical nationalist and extreme religious parties with no interest in democracy, who want to totally change the character of the state.

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“All the masks were torn off, we know who they are,” Bressler said of Netanyahu’s coalition. “They have tried to do in two months what it took Viktor Orbán 10 years to do.” She was referring to Hungary’s illiberal prime minister, openly admired by both Netanyahu and Trump, who has muzzled that country’s courts and media and created a virtual one-party system, with the illusion of elections.

“If our democracy fails, judging by Hungary and Poland (whose courts have also been crushed by the government) I’ll find myself in jail. It seems quite unbelievable. We have to win.”

If her fear seems overwrought, its reality was brought home to many Israelis by the immediacy of the government’s threat. Once the Supreme Court is made subordinate to the governing parties, it will be very difficult to reverse the damage. Furthermore, the governing coalition has prepared 150 or so bills that would take advantage of a neutered court by enabling corruption, protecting Netanyahu from being ousted, and further destroying democratic norms.

Moreover, to retain power, Netanyahu has made himself beholden to small coalition partners like the Jewish National Front, headed by Itamar Ben-Gvir, who has been jailed and was rejected for army service because of his embrace of Jewish terrorism.

Yet Ben-Gvir, who wants to annex the occupied West Bank, and recently advocated burning down a Palestinian town (his later apology was forced), has been made national security minister — and Netanyahu has promised him his own personal militia.

Already, Ben-Gvir has requested the power to arrest and hold Israelis without trial — a process known as “preventive detentions,” and used against Palestinians on the West Bank. This would be like ending the right of habeas corpus in the United States.

So it was with knowledge of this dangerous governing coalition that a small group of entrepreneurs, retired senior military officers, legal experts, and social activists got together in mid-December to establish a future headquarters for protest. “We felt it was indispensable to get civil society together,” I was told by attorney Gilead Sher, one of the organizers who served as chief of staff and senior negotiator with the Palestinians for former Prime Minister Ehud Barak.

As different communities and social groups began to gather among themselves and look for ways to protest, they would gradually link up with this loose organizing structure — from existing nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), neighborhood groups, women’s groups, high-tech business associates, lawyers, doctors, psychologists, or just groups of friends. “We are only the enablers,” Sher told me. “This is bottom-up, spontaneous.”

Despite government attempts to label the demonstrators as leftist “elites,” the base is broad, including centrists, center-rightists, and many religious Israelis. Moreover, the so-called elite — the tech sector, professionals, academia, and other international businessmen — are the Israelis who have built the country’s “start-up nation.” Without these communities, Israel’s economy would falter. Already, Moody’s has downgraded Israel’s credit status because of the upheaval.

And most critically, the organizing extends to military retirees and reservists around the country, who play a far greater role in society than most Americans could imagine.

“You can count at least 35 military groups [organizing for protests],” I was told by retired brigadier general Giora Inbar, another of the central organizers. “They include pilots’ groups and intelligence and special units and navy,” he related.

Military reservists are not only protesting for democratic values. They are also angered by Netanyahu’s alliance with ultraorthodox religious parties who seek permanent guarantees their members will never have to serve in the military, thus putting the burden on the shoulders of the rest of the country.

“We are ready to sacrifice our lives for our nation,” said Inbar, “so long as it is a democracy and equalizes the burden” between all Israelis. Under Netanyahu, the government is going in the opposite direction.

The organizers do provide ideas for strategy and some logistics, coordination, and legal advice for protests in 150 large and small cities and towns, and neighborhoods across the country. Money is raised by crowdfunding and donations from Israelis inside and outside the country.

With unprecedented persistence, hundreds of thousands of demonstrators continue to rally every weekend. At their height, the rallies have comprised around 5% of the population, which, in comparison with the United States, would mean around 16 million people demonstrating across the country.

But what is most striking about this spontaneous eruption of pro-democracy protest is that it has united some of the most productive communities in Israel against Netanyahu’s effort to spring a judicial coup for personal gain.

I have seen for myself the massive educational impact the protests have had on the Israeli public. Friends have shown me the myriad of WhatsApp messages flooding their phones, initially offering legal information on the meaning of the so-called judicial “reform” and continuing with discussion groups on key issues. Like Americans, many Israelis were not well-versed in government mechanics before Netanyahu’s assault.

On one Israeli friend’s phone, I saw invitations to a dozen WhatsApp groups, from “hope spreaders” to “brothers in arms” to “protectors of non-violence” to calls for translators to “make sure foreign media knows what is going on.”

The overarching question is whether a civic revolution can force a government to change its policy by nonviolent means.

Of course, the overarching question is whether a civic revolution can force a government to change its policy by nonviolent means.

So far, the protests — and the education of the public they have achieved — have led to a dramatic drop in support for Netanyahu’s Likud Party, according to the latest polls, predicting that his coalition would drop from 64 out of 120 seats in the Knesset to 52 seats if new elections were held right now. But that does not mean his coalition will crack.

However, the vast difference between bottom-up support for democracy and top-down support for Netanyahu’s illiberal plans was visible at the first major demonstration for Netanyahu’s agenda in Jerusalem, which I attended last Thursday.

The crowd (reported at about 150,000 people) was comprised mainly of West Bank settlers and orthodox religious families, most of whom had been bused in from outlying towns. The government had been talking up the demonstration for days, the speakers were government ministers and members of parliament, and political party funds had picked up much of the cost of the buses. Attendees trampled on a huge banner on which was printed the face of the president of the Supreme Court.

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When I spoke with demonstrators, I heard repeatedly that it was the Tel Aviv “elite” protesters who were destroying democracy. The Netanyahu government promotes the same mantra that Trump supporters often use: The party that wins the most votes should have absolute power and be able to do whatever it wants. But in Israel, that line appears to be losing support.

Netanyahu may try to delay the judicial “reform” in hopes the pro-democracy crowd will fade, or he may try to sneak some of the bills through, after a pause, in order to keep his coalition from breaking apart.

But the unity, the thoughtfulness, the belief in — and understanding of — democratic principles that I heard on the streets of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv (despite the avoidance of the Palestinian issue) was amazing. It was testimony to the ability of an informed populace to rise up against an effort to destroy democratic institutions that had long been taken for granted.

In Israel, a longtime apathy toward democracy has been replaced by a determined struggle to retain it. Pay attention, you who worry about U.S. democracy. McCarthy’s indifference to Netanyahu’s assault on democratic institutions signals what to expect as our election season heats up.

Join Worldview columnist Trudy Rubin for an online conversation about her recent reporting trip to Israel at 11 a.m. Friday, May 5 at Inquirer.com/inquirer-live.