Right-wing Israeli coalition goes against everything you hold dear

A few days ago, I had the privilege of meeting Professor Deborah Lipstadt, the United States special envoy for monitoring and combating antisemitism, after her keynote speech at the South African Jewish Board of Deputies (SAJBD) Gauteng conference.

I was the only Israeli there who wasn’t on duty as an official of any establishment or institution.

I was able to appeal to her for a frank response from the American government to a possible appointment of racist ministers and the creation of an extreme-right-wing coalition in Israel. With kind Yiddishe Mama eyes, the ambassador answered in fluent Hebrew: the American administration will react to the new Israeli coalition, but she couldn’t do so because it’s not part of her portfolio of confronting antisemitism.

Yes, antisemitism is apparently something else. The SAJBD gave a great example of this when the Board and its lawyers paid tribute to the lengthy case against Bongani Masuku that ended a few months ago with a clear verdict from the Constitutional Court, namely that demonstrating against Israel with anti-Jewish slogans and symbols like swastikas is hate speech and an act of antisemitism.

In a few days, Israel will be led by a purely radical right-wing coalition for the first time. Re-elected Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu doesn’t have any moderate parties willing to sit with him in government. They don’t want to back a criminal defendant who intends to change the Israeli judicial system in order to postpone his own trial.

So, to get back in power, Bibi had to co-operate with the extreme forces he promoted in order to maximise his bloc. However, it’s evident that he doesn’t really want them as partners. Those influential allies – more than half of the Likud’s new coalition – have their own reasons to reform the courts and attorney’s office. And obviously, they also intend to make their own changes to suit their beliefs and needs.

These are the political leaders who protest under the slogan “Death to all Arabs”. These are the party heads who call for the segregation of Jewish and Muslim women in hospitals. These members of the Knesset just a few days ago attended the yahrzeit of the racist Meir Kahane and their hero, the murderer of dozens of Muslim worshippers, Baruch Goldstein. These are the provocateurs who want to release the late Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin’s murderer from jail.

These are the leaders who insist that they want the law of Israel to be solely based on the halacha. These same leaders want to change the Law of Return and prevent the right of people with one Jewish grandparent to become Israeli citizens.

These are the parties with an agenda against the LGBTQI (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transexual, queer, intersex) communities, against women’s rights, against the pope visiting the holy land, and who support so many other strict and offensive values.

I understand that from a distance, here in South Africa and across the globe, you generally support Israel as a Jewish state. The land is ours. Nothing should threaten the Zionist dream we’ve held for generations. I also believe that if you had the opportunity to vote in the diaspora, many of you may have voted like 10% of Israelis and supported the Religious Zionist Party. You would have done so for many reasons. This is, in fact, even easier when you’re outside of Israel and far from the details and practicalities of what this means.

I also don’t have any doubts about our right to Israel, a Kruger National Park-sized piece of land. But this corner of the former Ottoman Empire was never empty. Other people lived there for centuries, and will continue to do so. It doesn’t matter what you call them. There are millions of other people living in Israel – at least 20% to 50% of the population, depending on who’s counting and how.

The Balfour Declaration and United Nations resolutions – which gave the Jewish people international support and permission to build a homeland and fulfil the dream of Shivat Zion (return to Zion) – all mentioned and acknowledged those natives of the land.

The Torah itself commands us, “The strangers who reside with you shall be to you as your citizens [Leviticus, 19, 34],” and reminds us, “for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.”

I know. It’s hard for Jewish communities to criticise the Israeli government. Especially in a situation in which you have an elite and national leadership which is hostile towards Israel, as is the case in South Africa. So standing up against Israel over one issue, you may believe, will get you into trouble in other areas.

However, you need to behave like your British sister community, which refused to meet one of those extreme leaders. You, as a community in South Africa, need to stand up against specific ministers in Israel because they go against the moral and ethical values you hold so dear. You have fought for so long against racism and extremism, and you need to lend your voice to stop this in Israel.

Tell the Israeli prime minister frankly that you respect Israeli democracy, but as Jews and South Africans, you cannot co-operate with those people he now has as partners. Condemn this co-operation. Reject any normalisation in hosting those extreme leaders. As South Africans, you know better than anyone else exactly what segregation policies lead to. Please help us Israelis to understand this, and bear it in mind.

Antisemitism has undermined Jews for generations. It still jeopardises Jewish existence, and diaspora Jewry’s proud full participation in society.

Protesting and demanding the expulsion and deportation of a certain religious or ethnic group when it relates to Jews is certainly antisemitism. What then is it when it’s against whites, or Muslims, or Arabs? Does it become acceptable if it isn’t aimed at Jews? Surely we should all be revolted by any person or party who wants to do the same thing to people who aren’t Jewish? And isn’t it even more abhorrent if this call comes from Jewish people against another ethnic group on our own piece of land?

Madam ambassador, when hatred of a collective happens at the hands of Jews or Israeli leaders, we must – and are in fact obliged to – regard it as being clearly within the portfolio of antisemitism. Let’s not turn the other cheek over this.

• Zvika (Biko) Arran is a publicist, social entrepreneur, lawyer, advisor to philanthropists, and has been in Israel briefly working on the elections. He lives in Johannesburg with his wife and four sons.