J Street has produced a powerful video denouncing Avigdor Lieberman and calling upon the American Jewish leadership to stand against his racism and betrayal of Jewish values:
Yesterday, I reported on Avigdor Lieberman’s wild new improvised Israeli foreign policy which involves dumping every peace initiative of the previous government, while simultaneously offending Israel’s two most important allies (among the few Israel has), the U.S. and Egypt. Today a few new developments in the Lieberman follies.
Only the effete among us could take offense at the fact that Lieberman, under investigation for a major corruption scandal, would appoint the new public security minister from the ranks of his own party. For those who may not know, this minister is the one who oversees public corruption investigations–that is, Lieberman’s. Like I said, you’d have to be a leftist Arab-lover to be offended by this. But to add insult to injury, Lieberman attended the ceremony at which the public security minister was sworn in for his new duties. And so did the senior police officers who are investigating Lieberman. Imagine how thick the tension must’ve been at that family bar mitzvah!
Today, brings word that the Israeli police questioned Lieberman for the first time about the case. For those who can remember back to the last Ice Age in Israeli politics (all of six months ago), a similar corruption investigation began in quite similar ways. The charges against Ehud Olmert began with such questioning. It took a while, but eventually the sheer magnitude of the larceny and multiple scandals brought Olmert down. Ironically, he still has not been brought to trial.
Which brings us to the question: what happens if Yvet gets nicked? This is not a guy who will go lightly. Neither will he resign, nor will he take kindly to a police investigation. If the charges do appear substantive and endanger his career, one has to ask whether his ministerial appointee will intervene to quash the case? And if that happens, how will the Israeli public react?
There is no great love for the Moldovan bouncer among Israelis, one a quarter of whom believe he’s unqualified to be foreign minister. So he doesn’t exactly have a groundswell of popular support backing him (aside from his true believer supporters). But more importantly, if the corruption charges stick and the investigation gets political legs, how will this impact the governing coalition? Should Lieberman be indicted and be pressured to resign, he could withdraw from the government. This would cause Bibi’s coalition to fall.
As Hamlet says in his magnificent soliloquy: “Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished.”
No, no, no, he MUST STAY! He’s possibly the best thing for the anti-Zionist cause since sliced bread.
I’m with Gert. Any politician can be corrupt–left, right, center, whatever. It’s to be expected.
Lieberman is valuable because he strips away the pretense that the Israeli government seeks peace. All an Israeli politician has to do is say he or she favors peace or the two state solution and then in the meantime they do whatever they want. Lieberman is too arrogant or stupid or whatever to play the game the way it is supposed to be played.
On the other hand, I may be overestimating American politicians. I’m assuming that there has to be some limit to their hypocrisy and that supporting Lieberman would be too much, but maybe not.