No right to lecture ‘defectors’

The bloc ridiculed as the “immunity bloc” is turning out to be the most moral thing in politics in years. The left-wing bloc, in contrast, is looking like a collective coming apart at the seams.

by Dr. Eithan Orkibi, ISRAEL HAYOM

There are some things that are so clear from a moral and practical perspective, that there’s really no need to write about them. And there are other things that are so clear from a moral and practical perspective that a whole industry of pundits and tweeters go on and on about them, and for a simple reason: they apparently are moral and practical indeed. I’m speaking of course of the panic over “defectors” that is frightening the Center-Left and rallying its best rhetorical canons for a psychological offensive against those pondering the possibility of crossing the lines and to give Likud the seats necessary to form a government.

Apparently, justifiably so. Ideological defection can be seen as a betrayal. But in this specific context of never-ending elections, the attempt to threaten the defectors with shaming is an insult to politics and morality.

What is at the base of this political project that brings, albeit narrowly, the Center-Left to a place, and even then with political training wheels and heaps of legal aid, where it can dream of replacing the nationalist government if not than with a group of ideological defectors? It is simply amazing to see the shamelessness now coming as injunctions in the press and social media on behalf of the agency – in full knowledge that without a movement of defectors from right to left – there could never have been any possibility of “the bloc” getting anywhere close to where it is now.

If the test is moral – because now everyone is warning of “moral betrayal” – please excuse me, but your slip is showing. You have essentially been restored, rebuilt, renovated and elevated to a level of a Center-Left bloc thanks to defectors that you welcomed to your home. And now you suddenly remember that defecting is immoral? What kind of rebirth can the Israeli left go through if it did not join, in full knowledge and agreement, an organized group of defectors?

The joke doesn’t stop there. The best minds of the peace camp have demanded over the past day their natural and historic right to be part of that political bloc, together with Avigdor (“the Arabs are a fifth column”) Lieberman and Bogie (“Peace Now are a virus”) Ya’alon. Not only have they stopped denying that it’s an “anti-Netanyahu” bloc, they are rationalizing the preference of personal politics over ideology. The amounts of self-deception and methodical fraud are incomprehensible: once it was immoral to betray ideology; as of yesterday it’s a moral crime to betray the privilege to betray principles.

Now, after it has been agreed upon out loud that giving up on ideology is permitted, they boldly move ahead to giving up on democracy. The madness has even turned into crazy propositions for retroactive individual-centric legislation or even the formation of a technocrat government – as long as they achieve their goal. And from this side alley into which they have dragged ideology, after abandoning their principles in the street – they explain that it is more moral to cooperate with Lieberman than with the Likud and Shas.

Basically, it’s simple: if you have more seats, go ahead and form a government. Stop hiding behind the Court and Ayman Odeh’s apron. Be fair to yourselves, to your voters, and to your partners with whom you are entering the political fight. If you’re a bloc – act as one, openly and bravely.

But you’re not. And the reason you’re not a bloc, and that you can’t make good on the 62 seats you have, has nothing to do with Netanyahu’s indictments or the “toxic atmosphere” that was created because of the elections. The reason you can’t work in harmony and replace Netanyahu naturally, with an alternate majority government, is that your project is based on mass defection and severe ideological polarization – and it’s falling apart at the moment of truth like a cheap dress.

The right wing-ultra-Orthodox bloc, which you ridicule as “the immunity bloc”, is turning out to be the most authentic, pure and moral thing in Israeli politics for years now. It is ideologically coherent, it is based on basic agreements on national issues, and most importantly – it works in harmony in order to reach its goals. One fact is indisputable: its main ideas are clearly preferred by the Israeli public.

One can discuss the question of how such a tactical union, for the sake of stabilizing the political system at this political moment, is moral or not. But one thing is indisputable: it is ten times more moral than bogging down the political system as part of a political project, whose declared ethos is a massive betrayal of principles and ideology. All this to get rid of the man whose path and leadership has gotten more legitimacy in the only test sanctified by democracy: the people’s vote.