WhatsappFor decades, right-wing Israelis complained that we voted right but received policies shaped by the left.
Yes, Netanyahu was Prime Minister for many years, but year after year his governments were constrained by coalition partners, massive international pressure and powerful legal, security and bureaucratic institutions that resisted the changes we voted for.
For goodness sake, a vast majority of Netanyahu’s years as Prime Minister were focused on stopping President Clinton, Obama and Biden from forcing the creation of a disastrous Palestinian state on us! That is the vast majority of his years serving as Prime Minister! Years of tremendous international pressure and threats, and all those years Netanyahu was playing defense! He had no chance to push forward the right-wing policies we voted for. Totally focused on defense to prevent the disastrous policies of the left.
That context is totally ignored and forgotten today.
Finally, this Netanyahu government of four years was different.
For the first time, the Israeli Right truly began to govern.
Ministers and MKs like Smotrich, Ben-Gvir, Levin, Rothman, Halevi, Karei and others finally began challenging the institutions run by the unelected left-wing bureaucrats and entrenched policies the Right had complained about for decades.
Judicial reform moved from campaign promises to an actual battle for change. Jewish development in Judea and Samaria accelerated like never before with 104 new Jewish communities and 160 farms to protect our land, alongside plans to strengthen Jewish settlement and governance in the Galilee and Negev.
Prison conditions for security prisoners were tightened, after decades of country club conditions with the prison authority literally allowing female prison guards to be sexually assaulted by the jihadi prisoners to appease them. People angry at Ben-Gvir because of his personality totally ignore the incredible changes he made to the prisons to finally treat our jihadi prisoners as they should. This government also began confronting the protection rackets and lawlessness that have plagued parts of the Negev and Galilee for years. These are all changes the unelected political left bureaucrats were against making all these years because the Arabs are an “oppressed minority”. Sound familiar?
There are enormous problems in this country that previous right-wing governments either could not or would not tackle because of the politically-left dominated bureaucracy and legal system. This government finally began tackling them. Their accomplishments are tremendous that too many Israelis fail to comprehend and fail to support in continuing out of anger over the Ultra-Orthodox draft issue.
Honestly, that’s just insane.
Is the job finished? Not even close. That is precisely the point. These four years were just the beginning of a transformation the Right has demanded for decades.
After finally seeing policies the Right has demanded for decades begin to be implemented, some right-wing voters are considering parties that could help produce a government led by Eisenkot that will reverse that direction, because either change has not come fast enough or because of justified anger over the ultra-Orthodox draft issue?
That makes no sense.
Most importantly, Oct. 7 shattered the failed security conception that Israel could manage jihadi enemies through deterrence, economic incentives, international agreements and quiet.
Israel went from decades of containing enemy threats to taking the fight directly to enemy territory across multiple fronts. Netanyahu withstood enormous international pressure to stop the war, and immense pressure at home from Eisenkot himself, former senior security officials, elements of the current military and intelligence establishment, and relentless media campaigns demanding an end to the fighting, all to “save the hostages”.
At the same time, this Netanyahu government has pushed changes in the IDF and intelligence establishment that would have been almost unimaginable before Oct. 7. That institutional battle is far from over, with serious disputes continuing between the elected government and the security establishment over strategy, military directives and the meaning of victory.
As Ofer Winter, a decorated army officer unfortunately thrown out of the army for supporting a military ethos of Jewish victory, has stated himself, Israel became “an army with a country.” It must return to being a country with an army, where the elected government determines policy and the military implements it. Not the opposite! And That is the process that Netanyahu, Katz and Smotrich have been trying to do since Oct. 7!
Has everything been fixed? Not at all!
That is precisely the point.
As we speak the IDF officials are trying to stop the government’s directive to destroy all the illegal Arab building near the terror attack in Hebron!
Finally we have a government trying to overcome the demented “progressive” policies of the IDF and legal establishment that stopped us from protecting our lives properly all these years.
And yet, right now, there are right-wingers ignoring all of this, instead choosing to vote for other parties that will lead us to abandon and reverse all the critical processes to protect us that have finally begun by Netanyahu, Smotrich and Ben-Gvir out of angry about the Ultra-Orthodox draft issue, an issue that we all want to solve as best as possible?
The ultra-Orthodox draft issue must be solved. But a sustainable solution requires serious changes, not populist slogans, within both the ultra-Orthodox community and the IDF so that greater Haredi service will succeed without demanding that Haredim abandon their religious way of life. That will not happen overnight. It will not happen with a law. And it will not happen by suddenly stopping all state subsidies to the Ultra-Orthodox.
The same principle applies to the war. Hamas must not be allowed to rebuild. Israel cannot return to trusting international guarantees while withdrawing from strategically essential territory and hoping jihadist enemies suddenly become peaceful.
That is the real choice every Israeli must examine in this election.
Not whether they agree with them giving in to Ultra-Orthodox pressure on the draft issue or other bills to prevent a toppling of the government.
Not whether this government was perfect. It wasn’t.
Not whether Netanyahu, Smotrich or Ben-Gvir made mistakes they disagree with. That’s politics.
The question is which direction Israel will go next?
Does Israel continue dismantling the failed assumptions exposed on Oct. 7, strengthening Jewish communities throughout the country, reforming institutions and rebuilding an IDF focused on victory?
Or does it return to the failed, dangerous policies of the political left of deterrence, withdrawals, international guarantees and the security establishment’s old conception of managing our enemies?
Eisenkot has already outlined the direction he wants to take: reliance on international guarantees, withdrawing IDF forces from Gaza, Lebanon and Syria, training 20,000 Gazans in Egypt for a future security force, and allowing as many as 150,000 Gazans to work inside Israel!
That last proposal is particularly difficult to comprehend after Oct. 7, when Gazans who had worked inside Israeli communities were among those invaders who massacred Jews they knew and worked for! Yet Eizenkot said it out loud! And some right-wingers are still ignoring the risk of their votes that might make him Prime Minister???
For years, right-wing Israelis demanded that the Right finally govern.
It finally began.
And now some right wingers want to throw it all away and risk total reversal of those policies out of anger at the Ultra-Orthodox draft issue?
We have accomplished too much, sacrificed too much and learned too much to return to Oct. 6.
It is absolute folly for any right-winger who understands the changes this government began to help us win this war and protect our lives to not vote for Netanyahu, Smotrich or Ben-Gvir.
Ultimately, our trust must be in God alone. But we can’t rely on miracles. We are obligated to do our part.
If we want to win this war, protect Jewish lives and continue the changes so many of us have prayed and voted for over decades, then we must all vote for either Netanyahu, Smotrich or Ben-Gvir.
Any vote for a party that is not certain to cross the electoral threshold is a gamble, and the price of that gamble will be Jewish lives.
This election is too consequential to take that risk.
Have faith in God. Then take responsibility for the future He has placed in our hands when we vote tomorrow.
Am Yisrael Chai!!!
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