Sturm und harangue

When there’s a storm a brewin’, the advice is normally to head for the hills. In the case of the tempest forming in the Knesset, though, the whole question is whether one can head for the hills, and retroactively appropriate them from Palestinians.

Like weather reporters standing in front of frothing waves before a hurricane, Israeli papers Monday morning squint into the squall between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Jewish Home leader Naftali Bennett over the so-called outpost bill and when it will or won’t come to a vote.

The tropical storm became a full-fledged barn-buster Sunday, after Netanyahu said he would look to delay the vote on the bill until after he meets with US President Donald Trump next week. Bennett refused to back down from his vow to take the controversial measure to the plenum on Monday, Netanyahu, departing for jolly old England to mind whatever gap there may be over Iran, said he wouldn’t be cowed by ultimatums, and the press was there to catch every last broadside between the two.

Mixing metaphors, Yedioth reports that “the storm turned into a battle that threatens the stability of the coalition.”

But it doesn’t exactly take Doppler radar to see that this stormfight is little more than a political facade, like a thin haboob blustering its way into the heartland, and most reports are viewed through that lens.

“Bennett, facing growing pressure from the right, gave everything he could to ensure that regulation bill comes up for a vote,” the paper reports. “After Amona was evacuated, his constituency is pushing him to act. But the prime minister thought differently.”

Actually, even Netanyahu may not know what he is thinking. Haaretz quotes a Knesset member apprised of the dispute saying “Netanyahu really doesn’t want to conduct the vote for fear of Trump’s response, but he is even more afraid of the possible reaction from Bennett.”

Adding to the confusion, Israel Hayom, which often acts as Netanyahu’s mouthpiece, plays up the conflict in its headlines, but downplays it in the text, writing that Netanyahu himself wanted to push the vote as quickly as possible. Despite a big honking front page headline trumpeting that the bill “is on its way to the Knesset,” the tabloid reports that actually what that means is that the debate will be held Monday, but the vote won’t come until after the Trump powwow.

Meanwhile, columnist Moti Tuchfeld points out that all this fighting is just people trying to grab political points, since the bill will pass, and be immediately shot down by the courts, making this all a pointless exercise in the banality of Israeli politics, and one which has pushed both Bennett and Netanyahu into positions they would rather not take.

“The Regulation Bill was hijacked after it passed its first reading. The decision not to advance it any further was made long ago. Around the law is a rare agreement between Netanyahu and Bennett, which comes with the understanding that they are in the same boat,” he writes. “Now that the bill has returned to life, everyone needs to act for their sides.”

In Haaretz, Zvi Barel compares Netanyahu’s turn toward the settlers, including the announcement of thousands of new homes, to Iran’s missile tests, in that both cases show leaders using the new White House as a punching bag to absorb the blows they are taking at home.

“Both countries are immersed in a boiling cauldron of political struggles that are spewing in the direction of the United States as well. One can assume that if Netanyahu was not trapped in Naftali Bennett’s chokehold, he would not have hastened to announce new construction in the settlements,” Barel writes. “It also seems that Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, which are very busy with tense preparations for May’s presidential election, wouldn’t necessarily have chosen to carry out the ballistic missile test now.”

Of course, Trump’s fingerprints are not on all the storms in the Israeli press. Two labor disputes also make major news, one surrounding a looming fight over the leadership of the country’s largest labor union, and one over El Al canceling flights over a dispute with pilots.

On the first issue, Yedioth calls the announcement by former Labor Party leader Shelly Yachimovich that she’ll run to head the Histadrut labor federation a “political bombshell,” especially given that the union’s current boss, Avi Nissenkorn, enjoys the full support of Yachimovich’s party. The tabloid notes that the announcement likely came as part of a deal between Yachimovich and Labor MK Eitan Cabel, who is thought to have eyes on Labor’s leadership (a deal denied by Yachimovich). Under the supposed terms, Yachimovich will back Cabel to head the party, while Cabel will back Yachimovich to be union boss.

In an accompanying column, Sima Kadmon writes that she doesn’t want to play favorites, and then, apparently thinking she’s more clever than she is by half, goes and does just that.

“Should the leader be Avi Nissenkorn, who was handed the plum position on a silver platter from [former Histadrut head] Ofer Eini – or is it Shelly Yachimovich whose path took her through the Knesset’s halls and as head of the Labor Party,” she asks.

But her larger point is that with all the backroom political deal-making, why not leave the Histadrut’s leadership up to a vote by the union’s 520,000 members?

“Respect the members of the Histadrut and give them the elementary right to vote and be voted in,” she writes.

And what about the peons dependent on those workers? Israel Hayom highlights the plight of poor Israelis stranded abroad or at home as El Al canceled over 10 flights over a labor dispute recently.
For two people stuck in Warsaw, dealing with the cancellation meant being extra Israeli, in their own words, and coming away quite a bit better than the last time Jews were stuck in Poland.

“We were forced to be Israeli to the end, and to ask help from a friend who we haven’t spoken to since high school. He actually came to the aid of those stranded in Warsaw, and from there all that remained was a terrible saga of skipping between failed ticketing attempts, phone calls, a conversation with a nice representative who couldn’t help, expressing intense anger on Facebook and extending our stay by a night. A few more zloties won’t kill us,” Orit Portikoff and Mor Leiv write. “So the kids spent another night at super-grandma, we are in a luxury hotel and it seems the biggest loser is the dog who is stuck another night in a cold cage in a kennel. For that, dearest El Al, you owe us an apology.”