Israel General Discussion: Annus Horribilis

[Hnv1]

I think it's unprecedented as armed forces are usually to the right of the elected government and not to the left. Kemalist Turkey is indeed the closest but even there that's not really a like to like.

[CumbrianLefty]

The obvious exception to that might be when said elected government is *very* right wing.

Like in Israel now?

[Hnv1]

The obvious exception to that might be when said elected government is *very* right wing.

Like in Israel now?

Only comparable situation would be outright fascist countries in Europe where the armed forces and traditional aristocracy were just right wing but not that right. But those countries weren’t liberal democracies so again different

[lfromnj]

Pilsudskis 1925 coup was actually supported by the leftists as well although he didn't work with them beyond a few months.

[Pres Mike]

If Netanyahu was actually about to do something that would endanger military aid or Iron Dome supplies from the US, the IDF would coup him in 5.2 seconds, most likely.

Question here: has a military coup ever happened in a country that has been as wealthy and an established democracy (within its internationally-recognized borders) as Israel? Wouldn't that turn Israel into something akin to Kemalist Turkey?

In terms of post-WW2 coups in Western democracies, Greece 1967 and Chile 1973 both come to mind. France 1961 and Spain 1981 both constituted real attempts. In the United States during the 1960s (Operation Northwoods) the government considered the possibility of a coup to be quite serious. Turkey obviously has had many military coups.

It would be a very singular event in the history of post-Cold War democracy (and really post-early 1980s democracy), but then Israel is a very singular country with, for now, a very singular demographic situation.

Operation Northwoods was to stag false flag attacks and blame Cuba, to justify an invasion. What does that mean for a coup? Did Kennedy fear a CIA/military coup?

[pppolitics]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/03/29/benjamin-netanyahu-tells-joe-biden-stay-israeli-politics/

"Benjamin Netanyahu tells Joe Biden to stay out of Israeli politics"

Imagine if Biden cut off aid to Israel and see how far Netanyahu can go.

[All Along The Watchtower]

Operation Northwoods was to stag false flag attacks and blame Cuba, to justify an invasion.

Not even real attacks. And it was just some dumb Joint Chiefs of Staff plan that Kennedy rejected. One among many dumb ”plans” that the military (and other natscec institutions/agencies) have presented to Presidents and/or the National Security Council for over half a century, the vast majority of which are rejected.

[Mike88]

New poll: Gantz party now tied with Likud. YA falls to 3rd place.

https://twitter.com/AsiaElects/status/1644327849581764608

[CumbrianLefty]

A few polls with zero seats for Labour now, what's that about?

[Angel of Death]

A few polls with zero seats for Labour now, what's that about?

Isn't it obvious? Too many Labour voters wanting to ensure Meretz passes the threshold next time, now at the expense of their own party. The parties will almost certainly run under a joint list next time to avoid such a yo-yo.

[Storr]

https://twitter.com/IDF/status/1644786618673381376?s=20

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

https://twitter.com/IDF/status/1644786618673381376?s=20

Will Bin Gvir and co try to fire whoever made the decision to follow policy?

[Vosem]

I think the problem of hyper-religious subgroups out-reproducing the rest of society is a problem that will eventually come for all First World societies, and Israel is simply ahead of the curve of the rest of us.

I don't see it. What groups in Christendom are really like the Haredim? The obvious examples are the Mennonites and Jehovah's Witnesses. Maybe you can make a case for Calvinists in the Netherlands, but I don't know to what extent they segregate themselves from broader society. There are pietistic Lutherans in Finland but they are a very small group.

Besides Laestadians in Finland (and actually also the US), other groups I was thinking of would include fundamentalist Mormons, certain Old Believers, subgroups within the Amish world (Swartzentrubers), and Old Order Mennonites (who actually have lots of colonies in Latin America) as examples of groups like this. (I don't know that Jehovah's Witnesses actually have remarkable fertility in the way that other groups like this do). Haredim are a much larger fraction of Israeli society than these other groups are of their societies, but as long as high fertility rates are sustainable they will become a large fraction of society eventually, and given the continuously falling fertility rates of mainstream society probably faster than we think.

I'm not familiar with groups like this within Islam, but then I'd imagine you would have much more knowledge than I would there.  

Presumably there are other groups in other countries that I can't name, but I am comfortable in saying that none of them are significant. Evangelicals in Brazil and elsewhere don't count because they are part of broader society. The same is true of Mormons. I know you said the First World specifically, but I will also add here that I'm not aware of any groups like this in the Islamic world.

I agree with this, but at least within the US conservatives have noticeably more children and have them at younger ages, and the gap between conservatives and liberals has been gradually growing in size since ~1990, before which it didn't exist. There are conflicting surveys on just how heritable political preferences are, so it remains something of an open question how much this will end up affecting American society. (There really isn't evidence for a gap like this in Europe, but I wonder about Latin America; Santiago, Chile, is supposed to be the metropolitan area with the lowest fertility rate in the Americas, while I've purely anecdotally noticed that conservative Chileans -- both politicians and just people I met when I visited that country -- tended to have large families, belying the country's low fertility overall. This is entirely a guess, though.)

It seems self-evident that religious people are more fertile than irreligious people, and perhaps in the long run this will lead to increased religiosity in society. Groups like the Haredim being the beneficiaries appears to be a specifically Jewish phenomenon.

I think the Haredim being so politically organized, both in Israel and the US, is a specifically Jewish phenomenon; you don't really see Amish bloc-voting in ways deliberately meant to position their community as kingmakers. (On reflection, many of these groups -- including Haredim -- seem to be particularly strong within the US, as opposed to other parts of the First World, and perhaps in some deep way to be the result of a specifically-American memetic environment). But "persistent closed-off ultra-religious high-fertility subgroup" does not seem to be a specifically Jewish phenomenon.

[Hnv1]

I think the problem of hyper-religious subgroups out-reproducing the rest of society is a problem that will eventually come for all First World societies, and Israel is simply ahead of the curve of the rest of us.

I don't see it. What groups in Christendom are really like the Haredim? The obvious examples are the Mennonites and Jehovah's Witnesses. Maybe you can make a case for Calvinists in the Netherlands, but I don't know to what extent they segregate themselves from broader society. There are pietistic Lutherans in Finland but they are a very small group.

Besides Laestadians in Finland (and actually also the US), other groups I was thinking of would include fundamentalist Mormons, certain Old Believers, subgroups within the Amish world (Swartzentrubers), and Old Order Mennonites (who actually have lots of colonies in Latin America) as examples of groups like this. (I don't know that Jehovah's Witnesses actually have remarkable fertility in the way that other groups like this do). Haredim are a much larger fraction of Israeli society than these other groups are of their societies, but as long as high fertility rates are sustainable they will become a large fraction of society eventually, and given the continuously falling fertility rates of mainstream society probably faster than we think.

I'm not familiar with groups like this within Islam, but then I'd imagine you would have much more knowledge than I would there.  

Presumably there are other groups in other countries that I can't name, but I am comfortable in saying that none of them are significant. Evangelicals in Brazil and elsewhere don't count because they are part of broader society. The same is true of Mormons. I know you said the First World specifically, but I will also add here that I'm not aware of any groups like this in the Islamic world.

I agree with this, but at least within the US conservatives have noticeably more children and have them at younger ages, and the gap between conservatives and liberals has been gradually growing in size since ~1990, before which it didn't exist. There are conflicting surveys on just how heritable political preferences are, so it remains something of an open question how much this will end up affecting American society. (There really isn't evidence for a gap like this in Europe, but I wonder about Latin America; Santiago, Chile, is supposed to be the metropolitan area with the lowest fertility rate in the Americas, while I've purely anecdotally noticed that conservative Chileans -- both politicians and just people I met when I visited that country -- tended to have large families, belying the country's low fertility overall. This is entirely a guess, though.)

It seems self-evident that religious people are more fertile than irreligious people, and perhaps in the long run this will lead to increased religiosity in society. Groups like the Haredim being the beneficiaries appears to be a specifically Jewish phenomenon.

I think the Haredim being so politically organized, both in Israel and the US, is a specifically Jewish phenomenon; you don't really see Amish bloc-voting in ways deliberately meant to position their community as kingmakers. (On reflection, many of these groups -- including Haredim -- seem to be particularly strong within the US, as opposed to other parts of the First World, and perhaps in some deep way to be the result of a specifically-American memetic environment). But "persistent closed-off ultra-religious high-fertility subgroup" does not seem to be a specifically Jewish phenomenon.

All of these groups participate in the labour market. Haredi participation is exceptionally low and if you deduct the faux jobs in their educational system male employment sinks to around 30%. there's nothing really like them

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

I think the problem of hyper-religious subgroups out-reproducing the rest of society is a problem that will eventually come for all First World societies, and Israel is simply ahead of the curve of the rest of us.

I don't see it. What groups in Christendom are really like the Haredim? The obvious examples are the Mennonites and Jehovah's Witnesses. Maybe you can make a case for Calvinists in the Netherlands, but I don't know to what extent they segregate themselves from broader society. There are pietistic Lutherans in Finland but they are a very small group.

Besides Laestadians in Finland (and actually also the US), other groups I was thinking of would include fundamentalist Mormons, certain Old Believers, subgroups within the Amish world (Swartzentrubers), and Old Order Mennonites (who actually have lots of colonies in Latin America) as examples of groups like this. (I don't know that Jehovah's Witnesses actually have remarkable fertility in the way that other groups like this do). Haredim are a much larger fraction of Israeli society than these other groups are of their societies, but as long as high fertility rates are sustainable they will become a large fraction of society eventually, and given the continuously falling fertility rates of mainstream society probably faster than we think.

I'm not familiar with groups like this within Islam, but then I'd imagine you would have much more knowledge than I would there.  

Presumably there are other groups in other countries that I can't name, but I am comfortable in saying that none of them are significant. Evangelicals in Brazil and elsewhere don't count because they are part of broader society. The same is true of Mormons. I know you said the First World specifically, but I will also add here that I'm not aware of any groups like this in the Islamic world.

I agree with this, but at least within the US conservatives have noticeably more children and have them at younger ages, and the gap between conservatives and liberals has been gradually growing in size since ~1990, before which it didn't exist. There are conflicting surveys on just how heritable political preferences are, so it remains something of an open question how much this will end up affecting American society. (There really isn't evidence for a gap like this in Europe, but I wonder about Latin America; Santiago, Chile, is supposed to be the metropolitan area with the lowest fertility rate in the Americas, while I've purely anecdotally noticed that conservative Chileans -- both politicians and just people I met when I visited that country -- tended to have large families, belying the country's low fertility overall. This is entirely a guess, though.)

It seems self-evident that religious people are more fertile than irreligious people, and perhaps in the long run this will lead to increased religiosity in society. Groups like the Haredim being the beneficiaries appears to be a specifically Jewish phenomenon.

I think the Haredim being so politically organized, both in Israel and the US, is a specifically Jewish phenomenon; you don't really see Amish bloc-voting in ways deliberately meant to position their community as kingmakers. (On reflection, many of these groups -- including Haredim -- seem to be particularly strong within the US, as opposed to other parts of the First World, and perhaps in some deep way to be the result of a specifically-American memetic environment). But "persistent closed-off ultra-religious high-fertility subgroup" does not seem to be a specifically Jewish phenomenon.

All of these groups participate in the labour market. Haredi participation is exceptionally low and if you deduct the faux jobs in their educational system male employment sinks to around 30%. there's nothing really like them

Drug addicts probably have better employment participation rates.

[Vosem]

All of these groups participate in the labour market. Haredi participation is exceptionally low and if you deduct the faux jobs in their educational system male employment sinks to around 30%. there's nothing really like them

Sure, but it would be possible to change welfare policies to make this kind of behavior impossible, and I think Haredi society would persist. (There might be greater defections to mainstream society in that case -- it's already the case that in Israel many more Haredim leave Haredi Judaism than do in the United States, in my understanding. But the whole society would not go away). I think sustained exceptional fertility rates are a more interesting characteristic, and a more relevant one for the future of humanity -- not just Judaism or Israel -- than labor market non-participation, which wouldn't survive probably-eventually-inevitable anti-welfarist politics.

[Oryxslayer]

All of these groups participate in the labour market. Haredi participation is exceptionally low and if you deduct the faux jobs in their educational system male employment sinks to around 30%. there's nothing really like them

Sure, but it would be possible to change welfare policies to make this kind of behavior impossible, and I think Haredi society would persist. (There might be greater defections to mainstream society in that case -- it's already the case that in Israel many more Haredim leave Haredi Judaism than do in the United States, in my understanding. But the whole society would not go away). I think sustained exceptional fertility rates are a more interesting characteristic, and a more relevant one for the future of humanity -- not just Judaism or Israel -- than labor market non-participation, which wouldn't survive probably-eventually-inevitable anti-welfarist politics.

Also Labor market participation is higher in the US among the specific populations when compared to Israel, so there certainly is a case for nurture creating an environment  that allows this population to do what it wants all the time vs some of the time.



Additionally....


https://twitter.com/AsiaElects/status/1645134880429277184?s=20

This is one of the more volatile pollsters, but that's still a big change which can't just be explained by samples. So is it just the court battles  and popular protest movement plus Gantz just doing well in a environment where security is in the news (for multiple reasons), or is there even more going on?

[Vosem]

All of these groups participate in the labour market. Haredi participation is exceptionally low and if you deduct the faux jobs in their educational system male employment sinks to around 30%. there's nothing really like them

Sure, but it would be possible to change welfare policies to make this kind of behavior impossible, and I think Haredi society would persist. (There might be greater defections to mainstream society in that case -- it's already the case that in Israel many more Haredim leave Haredi Judaism than do in the United States, in my understanding. But the whole society would not go away). I think sustained exceptional fertility rates are a more interesting characteristic, and a more relevant one for the future of humanity -- not just Judaism or Israel -- than labor market non-participation, which wouldn't survive probably-eventually-inevitable anti-welfarist politics.

Also Labor market participation is higher in the US among the specific populations when compared to Israel, so there certainly is a case for nurture creating an environment  that allows this population to do what it wants all the time vs some of the time.

Oh, interesting, I hadn't realized that. I think it might be the case that there are more 'intermediate' cultures in Israel -- still-religious but not Haredi groups -- compared to the US, where the Jewish mainstream is much more secular than Israeli Hilonim and Jews are not really that large of a fraction of society overall.

Additionally....


https://twitter.com/AsiaElects/status/1645134880429277184?s=20

This is one of the more volatile pollsters, but that's still a big change which can't just be explained by samples. So is it just the court battles  and popular protest movement plus Gantz just doing well in a environment where security is in the news (for multiple reasons), or is there even more going on?

I think it shouldn't be underestimated how much 'failure to get a priority through' hurts governments even when that priority is very unpopular. If you didn't like Bibi's court-packing scheme, you obviously still dislike Bibi, but if you did like it -- or just didn't have a strong opinion -- he now seems incompetent and like a weak leader. It also seems like Gantz has done a good job positioning himself as a credible alternative to the voters who were the most moderate and gettable Bibi supporters in 2022.

https://twitter.com/ZamZamCola/status/1645119446409793537

[AndyHogan14]

I haven't been following Israeli politics all too much recently. I am just seeing crisis after crisis in the news without any real end in sight. For those that have been paying attention, is there any real risk of Netanyahu's government falling and elections are called? Is there any end in sight to the political/judicial/diplomatic chaos?

[Torrain]

Nice to see that Netanyahu is being rewarded for his autocratic BS with approval ratings on par with mid/late stage Truss.

https://mobile.twitter.com/ElectsWorld/status/1645146217473617921

[Estrella]

Are there enough Likudniks left who haven't gone full JonesBibitown (or just want to save their seats) for a New Hope 2.0?

[CumbrianLefty]

Are there enough Likudniks left who haven't gone full JonesBibitown (or just want to save their seats) for a New Hope 2.0?

If this poll slump lasts, there must be the chance of something happening I would have thought.

[Zinneke]

Seriously? After several defections (starting arguably with Bennett), and new attempts to create a Bibi-less Likud-style party, surely whoever is in Likud now is a die hard?

[Mike88]

Bibi's U-turn: Netanyahu "re-hires" Yoav Gallant as Defense Minister.

https://twitter.com/spectatorindex/status/1645537053499871232

[Hnv1]

Seriously? After several defections (starting arguably with Bennett), and new attempts to create a Bibi-less Likud-style party, surely whoever is in Likud now is a die hard?

Not everyone. Bitan, Edelstein, I. Katz, Barkat, Danon, and others are not Bibi enthusiasts and are loyal to various extents with varying motivations. They won't form a breakaway faction (well Edelstein might leave but that's about it) though, only pressure Bibi from within.

As much as some of them dislike Bibi personally, they know he's on borrowed time. Bibi's demise has never been closer. Why portray yourself as a traitor with the post-Bibi era around the corner?

I think they're wrong in one key aspect: they all assume Likud is going to remain a single unified party and I think it will splinter.