Apathy and assault

Stricken by a slow news week, the three major Hebrew-language newspapers turn to favorite culture wars in their Wednesday coverage.

Yedioth Ahronoth continues its campaign to raise awareness of sexual assault against women, leading with two pieces on the issue, one on the recent allegations of rape against the president of the Keshet Media group, Alex Gilady, and another on alleged misconduct by an unnamed professor at Tel Aviv University. Gilady has stepped down from his position following the allegations.

Another short headline on the paper’s front page refers readers to an article on former prime minister Ehud Barak’s role in putting the now-disgraced Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein in touch with an Israeli firm comprising mostly ex-Mossad agents that Weinstein hired to help suppress accusations of sexual harassment and assault against him by dozens of women. Barak has admitted to putting the producer in touch with Black Cube, a private Israeli intelligence agency headquartered in Tel Aviv, but said he did not know why Weinstein was interested in its services.

Haaretz, as is its wont, delves with gusto into the intricacies of the ongoing investigations surrounding Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his confidants. The paper argues that the Israeli leader is on the brink of being unseated, since he will no longer be able to distance himself from the allegations come election-time. “The stench [around the prime minister] is noticeable, even without an indictment,” writes commentator Chemi Shalev.

“A generous interpretation might claim that Netanyahu’s endless tenure has blurred the lines between what is allowed and what is not in his mind, and between what is private and and what is public. A less generous interpretation might hold that Netanyahu is a bull in a china shop,” Shalev offers. Nevertheless, the correspondent concedes that the prime minister’s standing among many of his constituents is still iron-strong, and that only concrete evidence implicating Netanyahu in one of the many cases surrounding him will ultimately bring about his downfall. But Shalev asserts — or perhaps hopes — that such a development is likely just around the corner.

Israel Hayom leads with a strident hit piece on Makbula Nassar, the incoming director of information and outreach for the Arab community at Israel’s Road Safety Authority, with the daily alleging that the newly appointed Arabic-speaking traffic safety czar is a “prominent activist against the state” due to her affiliation with several pro-Palestinian organizations.

The right-wing daily does not even attempt to mask its contempt for Nassar, who, reporter Daniel Sirioti reminds readers more than once, now receives a salary from the state. Nassar, according to Israel Hayom, “supports displaced Palestinians” and took part in marches to mark the “Nakba,” or the “catastrophe,” the name Palestinian give to their flight and dispossession during Israel’s founding in 1948. She even once criticized “Haifa’s Zionist mayor [Yona Yahav]” over the city’s plan to revamp the Palestinian neighborhood of Wadi Salib, as she raised concerns that the overhaul would hurt local and disadvantaged Arab residents and erase the area’s history, the paper adds.

“It is not at all certain that Nassar’s appointment would have been approved if a background check had been conducted before she was placed in such a public position,” argues the article. Nassar maintains that her criticism of state policies with regards to the Palestinians never crossed any legal lines, and that the daily’s claims are part of a “witch hunt” being waged against her. For its part, the Road Safety Authority said it “hires employees regardless of their political leanings, gender, sexual orientation, and similar criteria, but instead based on their level of suitability for the position in question.” Nassar, the authority adds in its statement, passed all the relevant tests and was found to be suitable for the position.

Back in Haaretz, Noa Osterreicher rages against the apathy she claims has stricken Israeli society. “One day they will raise their heads from their smartphones and ask — tell us, how did you live like this?” Osterreicher writes. The contributor explains that Israelis have become content with their leaders, and have come to accept that corruption is the way of the world. “And this is the problem with numbness: Unlike wealth – it really trickles down,” Osterreicher continues, managing a jab at prevailing economic theories at the same time.

“One day they will raise their heads from their smartphones and ask: How is it that the standards dropped from integrity to the appearance of integrity, from ‘the case was closed’ to ‘but no indictment was filed’ or ‘there was no conviction, and if there was a conviction, [it was only] breach of trust?’ A leadership whose main claim is that no indictments were yet filed and that at least we live in a place where buses aren’t blowing up – is that all it takes, Israelis, for you to accept that [these leaders are] responsible for your life and death?”