When the Likud dropped to 12 seats in the March 2006 election, this meant that secular Zionism was dead. Moreover, in that election the National Religious Party had to unite with National Union to be politically visible—which suggests that religious Zionism is moribund. I conclude that 20th century Zionism, which founded the State of Israel, is obsolete, and this means that Israel lacks the semblance of any ideology.
Zionism has metamorphosed into an anti-Jewish post-Zionism. Superficial observers blame the Labor Party for this decadent state of affairs. But the Likud is also blameworthy, having been nothing more than the right-wing of Labor’s leftward sliding party—as illustrated by the existence of Kadima. Even more culpable are the religious parties which, despite their promotion of Torah education, have contributed either to the corruption or to the contraction and emasculation of the supposed-to-be Jewish state.
The seed of this national decay was planted in the opening sentence of Israel’s so-called Declaration of Independence (which four rabbis signed). Aping the 19th century doctrine of territorial nationalism, the secular authors of that document proclaimed, at the very outset, that “The Land of Israel was the birthplace of the Jewish people.” This falsehood, this denial of the Sinai Covenant which made the Jewish people a nation under God—this is the fundamental cause of Israel’s political disintegration and territorial truncation.
Having made territorial nationalism the basis of the Jewish State, and having thereby abandoned the only solid justification for such a state—God’s Covenant with the Jewish people—divine justice requires the piece-by-piece loss of that territory. This is why well-intended but misguided critics of the “territory-for-peace” policy have had no impact on Israel’s misguided government.
What the critics should have emphasized is that the metamorphosis of Zionism into post-Zionism is a consequence of secular Zionism’s misuse of the term “Zion.” That term is one of the most sacred words in the dictionary of authentic Judaism. Zion is the dwelling place of God’s glory. It is the Sanctuary of the Torah, the Holy City which surrounds it, the Holy Land of which Jerusalem is the eternal capital. From Zion, from Jerusalem, the word of God—the Truth—shall come forth. Because the term “Zion” has been corrupted, Jerusalem is now on the negotiating table of our post-Zionists.
This is the price to be paid for betraying the God of Israel and His Covenant with the Jewish people. Indeed, that Covenant of old, which endowed the Jewish people with life and direction, has been replaced by a new covenant: Israel’s covenant of death with the PLO-Palestinian Authority. (See Isaiah 28:15.) Infamy of infamies, however, the religious parties condoned this new covenant and have even aided and abetted the expulsion of 10,000 Jews from Gaza and northern Samaria. How? By having collaborated with the Sharon-Likud government, the government that betrayed the nation by adopting Labor’s unilateral disengagement plan.
And even now, with death hovering over Israel, the religious parties, no less than their secular counterparts, would subject the fate of countless Jews in Judea and Samaria to a national referendum—never mind the fact that Arabs comprise 20% of Israel’s population. Moral and intellectual decay permeates all these parties.
The political heirs of those who founded the State of Israel had to offer a substitute for decayed Zionism to justify their political existence. And so Israel’s ruling elites now adorn themselves in the cloak of Democracy, the god of modernity. Not only has the god Democracy taken the place of Zionism for the Labor Party. Every party in the Knesset genuflects to this god, which few Israelis truly understand!
Ponder, therefore, the words of Jeremiah (2:11-13):
“Has a nation [ever] exchanged its gods, [even] though they are not [genuine] gods? Yet My people has exchanged its glory for something vain. Be astonished, O Heavens, over this; and be horribly afraid, be utterly amazed and devastated — says the Lord. For my people have … forsaken Me …”
Notice how fearful and how confused this country is. But notice also this: Nothing can be more desperate and dangerous than Israel’s ruling elites. Because they have no ideology other than the meaningless pluralism of Democracy, these elites can only destroy or seek to destroy the Judaism still alive in Israel. Hence they want to transform Israel into a “state of its citizens,” precisely the (initial) aim of Israel’s Arab parties. Power has become the paramount purpose of Israel’s ruling elites, thus their treachery.
Let us face some ugly facts. The Left is dependent on the Arab vote to gain and maintain power. Hence the Oslo or Israel-PLO agreements. The Left’s policy of “territory for peace” means not only “territory for power” but “Judaism for power.”
Again, the Left is not solely to blame for this treachery. Given Israel’s grotesque parliamentary system where the entire country constitutes a single electoral district necessitating proportional representation, even the Likud and the religious parties kowtow to Arab voters to win an extra seat in the Knesset. This is one reason why “right-minded” Jewish Knesset Members do not take concerted action to remove the parliamentary immunity of Arab MKs who not only violate the law prohibiting any party that negates the Jewish character of the State but who openly commit treason.
How ironic, for the State of Israel is not and cannot be truly Jewish if severed from the Sinai Covenant! This is precisely why “right-minded” Jewish MKs, secular as well as religious, lack the will to disqualify their seditious Arab colleagues. Of course they also fear the slur of “racism,” and no wonder. Having exchanged Democracy for the God of Israel, they are steeped in contemporary democracy’s moral egalitarianism! Unlike classical or normative democracy, contemporary or normless democracy erodes conviction in the justice of one’s cause. The result is “men without chests”—cowards for prime ministers.
The problem, however, is not to jettison Democracy, but to assimilate its principles to Torah norms and principles of governance, as I have done in my book Jewish Statesmanship: Lest Israel Fall. This book, allow me to say, can provide a would-be statesman with a comprehensive program designed to rescue Israel from its moral confusion and from the deadly quagmire into which the country has fallen as a result of its self-destructive Zionist foundations.
But now let me reiterate a practical program. On previous occasions I have recommended that ten professional individuals representing a cross-section of Israeli society form a team whose immediate object is to find a person capable of leading this country—a person untainted by Oslo. Let them form a constitutional party, the program of which is outlined in my booklet “The Myth of Israeli Democracy: Toward a Truly Jewish Israel.” I am calling for the establishment of a party whose explicit goal is “regime change.”
Everyone knows we face a crisis in leadership. But there can be no effective leadership in Israel when its government or cabinet consists of five or more rival political parties. Hence Israel needs a unitary executive, a presidential system comparable to that of the United States. But a president must be checked and balanced by a strong legislature, which requires members of the legislature to be elected by and accountable to the people in multi-district elections.
The team I have in mind will form several committees paralleling government ministries—an alternative government. The team should then hold a national conference and inform the public that its new constitutional party offers the only serious and comprehensive program of national salvation. It must call for new elections and establish a grass roots movement for the purpose.
We have had enough analysis of Israel’s decrepit government—analysis which only perpetuates paralysis. Needed is action. Are there any brave souls ready to take action for God’s sake?
