.jpg){kind=small}
mini.jpg)
I recently wrote a post about a skit on Israel’s Eretz Nehederet TV political satire program which takes on the settler movement. In the skit, settlers have take a Gilad Shalit-type IDF soldier hostage and are making demands of the Israeli government. Suddenly they realize the government has already conceded every demand they’ve made. The satiric message is that the settlers have taken not just a solider hostage, but the entire Israeli population. And by doing so the settlers have achieved almost all of their interests and demands.
In the skit, one of the kidnappers is a dead ringer for settler Knesset member, Yaakov Katz (Ketzeleh). As can be expected, Katz was not amused, especially since he is a wounded IDF veteran himself. In this YouTube video of a Knesset education committee hearing on the broadcast, Ketzeleh goes apoplectic. He was going so fast and furious that it challenged my own translation abilities and I didn’t notice this absolute nugget which Ron Kampeas discovered on the tape:
“When the day comes, and we will be in power, there will be retroactive laws against all those who were anti-Semitic against settlers and against the people of Israel and against the army, they will face trial.”
Hardly anyone has ever made the mistake of accusing settlers of supporting Israeli democracy, so this outburst of Jewish quasi-fascism shouldn’t surprise. Actually, this is pure Kahanism, in which secular Jews and other peaceniks are not just political opponents but a cancer in the body politic. Because Israelis like the actors and writers for Eretz Nehederet constitute such a poison and danger to Israel, there is no need to observe the niceties of democracy in dealing with them. Lock ‘em up and throw away the key.
Note in the Knesset member’s diatribe, the satiric portrayals of the settlers political positions become “anti-Semitic” through a magical transformation in demagogue Katz’s mind. Further, any insult against the settlers is an insult against the entire people of Israel because the settlers ARE Israel. Lest anyone object to my use of the term fascist above, please note that it is the Pinochets and Argentine generals who made insulting the military a crime punishable by prison or death. What Ketzeleh is suggesting for the future when he comes to power is nothing less: an Israel controlled by settlers in collaboration with police and military forces and in which the judiciary is a handmaiden to the security forces.
Yidn: this is not the way.
Tags: gilad-shalit, israeli settlers, ron-kampeas
I shudder to think that this could be the future of Israel. The Palestinians already live under oppression and torment. May God protect them should these extremists ever take over the government in Israel.