A-Infos (en) Italy, Sicilia Libertaria: Israel: Interview with a comrade from Ter Aviv - The nightmare Netanyahu is back (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

In Israel, the most radical and xenophobic right has returned to power. This 
means that the already strongly anti-Palestinian and illibertarian policies of 
the outgoing government will undergo a militaristic boost and the consolidation 
of the occupation of Palestinian lands and the expulsion of the legitimate 
inhabitants. Together with Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud, the Otsma Yehudi party 
(Jewish Power), the Religious Zionist Party and the Noam party entered the 
government, forming a coalition of fundamentalist and fascist fanatics. ---- We 
interviewed a comrade from Tel Aviv about this situation. ---- 1) After the 
recent general elections, Netanyahu returned to power supported by the far right; 
what can we expect from this new government regarding the issue of civil rights, 
Israeli-Palestinian relations and the occupied territories?

As I'm writing these lines, the new government hasn't officially come to power 
yet - it will only happen in the next few days. A friend of mine wrote something 
that captures the feelings of many Israelis right now:

"What is the difference between the new government and a nightmare? No need to 
wait for a nightmare to begin...". Since the new government is considered, at 
least on paper, as the most religious, fascist and corrupt we have ever had, we 
can expect very bad things to happen on all the issues mentioned: they will try 
to change the law and control the Israeli supreme high court , shut down leftist 
and human rights organizations, crack down on dissent, purge "progressive" 
studies from the public education system, especially anything related to gender 
issues, support an ultra-capitalist policy, give a free hand to police, soldiers 
and settlers to be even more violent and deadly towards Palestinians and, most 
importantly for Netanyahu, to free him from the prosecution he is facing for 
breach of trust, bribery and fraud. Everything I mentioned was part of the 
electoral program of the new government's politicians. Whether they actually will 
is yet to be seen.

2) Is there a non-parliamentary opposition (radical and libertarian) trying to 
oppose the government's racist and militarist policies?

There is a very small minority of activists who go to protests in the West Bank, 
participate in solidarity actions, refuse military service and so on. And there 
are also the NGOs that document human rights violations in the occupied 
territories and the discrimination of the Palestinian population inside Israel. 
All of those mentioned above are targets of the new government but they represent 
only a small segment of Israeli society. On the other hand there is mass 
antagonism towards the new government from more traditional elements of society 
(for example from the liberals, the Zionist left and the workers' organisations) 
and it can be foreseen that the moment the new government will try to make 
"radical" changes, for example removing the power of the Israeli high court and 
subjugating judges to politicians, there will be protests and clashes in the 
streets. This would open up a dilemma for the radicals: should they join forces 
with people and parties who want to oppose the far right just to bring Israel 
back to "normal"? A normality that includes, among other things, the occupation 
of the territories of millions of Palestinians, military tribunals, 
administrative detention and almost daily killings by the army. Personally, I 
think radicals should join the future protest movement and shape it from within. 
You know how a fight starts but you don't know how it will end... The changes 
that the new government is pushing for would make our society even more 
oppressive, authoritarian and could open the door to a dictatorship inside Israel.

3) Are there movements that actively collaborate with the Palestinian resistance, 
or in any case with Palestinian groups not linked to Hamas?

There is no connection (as far as I know) with Palestinian armed groups. There 
are ties to struggling communities, popular committees, farmers, activists and 
academics. On a very favorable day, the Israeli radical left can mobilize a few 
hundred people for a demonstration in the West Bank. But most of the time only a 
handful of activists are there to help against settler attacks. Lately these same 
activists have been so delegitimized that settlers and soldiers feel safe enough 
to attack them too. There are many NGOs working on human rights issues concerning 
Palestinians, and there are also joint political parties of Palestinian citizens 
of Israel with Jewish citizens, grassroots organizations and so on.  Yet it is 
obvious that existing organizations have failed to stop the deteriorating 
situation and a new vision is desperately needed.

https://www.sicilialibertaria.it/
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