Shortly after it became apparent that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Likud Party had survived a close election and would retain power over the nation’s government, the New York Times released a scathing editorial criticizing Netanyahu for going ugly and utilizing racism and anti-Palestine sentiment to energize far-right Israeli voters. In particular, the NYT editorial board took offense to Netanyahu stating on the eve of the election that he would never allow a separate Palestinian state as well as the Prime Minister stoking racist fears by claiming that Israeli right-wingers were in danger of losing power because Arab voters were mobilizing. In the early hours Wednesday, with nearly all of the polls reporting, Netanyahu’s Likud Party had grabbed at least 29 of the 120 seats in Israel’s parliament, the Knesset. Meanwhile, the Zionist Union, a center-left party, obtained at least 24 seats. Isaac Herzog, the party’s leader and Netanyahu’s opponent for Prime Minister, called Netanyahu on Wednesday morning to concede defeat. Exit polls on Tuesday showed the race to be a toss-up. A few weeks ago, it seemed like Netanyahu would cruise to an easy victory. However, that was before he accepted an invitation from Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH) to speak before Congress. The speech was seen as a slap in the face of President Obama, and dozens of Democrats refused to attend. The major issues surrounding the appearance is that Boehner and Bibi did an end-around and didn’t go through the White House. On top of that, the whole speech was just a way for conservatives to further undercut nuclear negotiations with Iran. The bad press surrounding the speech, both there in the United States and abroad, presented an opening for opposition parties and put Netanyahu in real danger of losing the election. Rather than moderate his stance and acknowledge that it was probably a mistake to engage in partisan politics in another country, especially a huge ally like the United States, Netanyahu decided to go to the extreme right in order to energize and mobilize the most rabidly conservative voters. The Times’ editorial slammed Netanyahu for going down that rabbit hole: Mr. Netanyahu showed that he was desperate, and craven, enough to pull out all the stops. On Monday, he promised that if his Likud faction remained in power, he would never allow the creation of a Palestinian state, thus repudiating a position he had taken in 2009.In order to win an election, Bibi increased the divide between Israelis and Palestinians, as well as Israel and the United States, while telling the Arab citizens of his country that he does not care about them. While he was able to retain the power he so desperately craves, his winning this most recent election further alienates Israel from the rest of the world, including the United States. He’s already proven that the only politicians he can work with in America are neo-cons and ideologically pure right-wingers. Source URL |