En artikel av Herb Keinon som lite förklarar vad som händer i Israel nu och varför.
The Jewish state hasn't figured itself out yet, 75 years after its inception
"On one side of an imaginary television screen, there could have been the chaotic scene at the “National Disruption Day” protest in Tel Aviv: the flag-waving protesters overpowering police barricades and attempting to block the country’s main road artery; the police’s forceful response, with officers on horseback, stun grenades, water cannons and dozens of arrests.
On the other side of the screen, there could have been a broadcast of the heartbreaking funeral in the Old Cemetery in Ra’anana of Elan Ganeles, murdered by Palestinian terrorists the day before as he was driving from the North through the Jordan Valley to a wedding in the Jerusalem area...
...THE PROTESTS against the judicial reform are a representation of the country – fully 75 years after its inception – still trying to figure out what it is. Is it a Jewish democratic state or a democratic Jewish state? What does it mean to be democratic? What does it mean to be Jewish? What is the right balance? How do you achieve that balance? What is the role of the legislature? What is the role of the courts?
At the core of the state’s identity, these questions should have been decided long ago, at Israel’s inception, but proved too difficult to solve.
The Declaration of Independence on May 14, 1948, stated that a Constitution should be adopted by an Elected Constituent Assembly no later than October 1, 1948. The Elected Constituent Assembly met four times before morphing into the Knesset. October 1, 1948, came and went, but no constitution was ever adopted. Because of conflicting interests, beliefs, ideologies and passions, no agreement could be reached.
So Israel did what Israel does so well: it improvised; it schlepped along on an ad hoc basis without a constitution, until it couldn’t anymore; it kicked the can down the road until the can finally hit a wall.
And that is where Israel finds itself on the eve of its 75th birthday, in front of that wall and unsure of how to kick the can past it. The coalition’s controversial judicial reform plan, the passionate opposition to the plan, the protests, “National Disruption Day” – all of that is the sound of that can hitting the wall...
...The pain following the killing of Hallel and Yagel Yaniv was searing. The fear that Jewish mothers and fathers who ply the road through Huwara daily and live in fear of a rock or petrol bomb thrown at them and their children while traveling to and from their homes in Har Bracha, Itamar, Yitzhar and Elon Moreh is real and ever-present.
But for that there is the state; for that there is an army; for that there is Jewish sovereignty. Jews do not – should not, must not – randomly set out to burn, kill and destroy. It is wrong. It is immoral. It is inexcusable.
It also badly confuses the chicken and the egg, as evident in this headline to a Reuters news story on the Ganeles murder: “Israeli-American motorist killed in West Bank after settlers rampage against Palestinians.”
As if this was an example of cause and effect; as if Ganeles’s murder was a result of the rampage in Huwara; as if, had there not been a rampage in Huwara, a promising 26-year-old man from Connecticut with a Zionist heart would still be alive today.
The rampage in Huwara, too, provided the country with other split-screen moments.
On one side of the screen, Jews randomly setting fire to cars, homes and businesses; on the other side IDF soldiers working with Palestinians to extract people from their burning homes. On one side of the screen, Esti Yaniv speaking with almost superhuman grace and dignity as the bodies of her two slain sons lie at her feet; on the other side, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich bringing opprobrium upon Israel by saying that Israel should wipe Huwara off the map...
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