Ben-Gurion’s grandson: Presence of ‘Kahanist’ minister at memorial ‘disrespectful’

A grandson of David Ben-Gurion on Wednesday told a minister from the far-right Otzma Yehudit party that he was not welcome at the annual state memorial for Israel’s first prime minister.

Yariv Ben-Eliezer, the son of Ben-Gurion’s daughter Geula, addressed the attendance of Negev and Galilee Development Minister Yitzhak Wasserlauf at the ceremony in Sde Boker marking 52 years since the inaugural prime minister’s death.

“It is disrespectful to my grandfather that the representative here from the government is from a Kahanist party,” said Ben-Eliezer, speaking off the cuff after he recited Kaddish, the mourner’s prayer, for his grandfather.

Ben-Eliezer said that Wasserlauf’s party negates “the beliefs and values of my grandfather, and [his presence] is a poke in the eye to all those who love Ben-Gurion.”

The Kach political party founded by extremist Rabbi Meir Kahane was outlawed by Israel in the 1980s for racism. Otzma Yehudit founder Itamar Ben-Gvir has nevertheless often cited Kahane as a major influence and was a member of the Kach youth movement as a teenager.

Ben-Gurion was the founder of the Mapai political party, the ideological predecessor of Israel’s Labor party.

Wasserlauf did not speak at the memorial event.

Speaking from prepared remarks following Ben-Eliezer’s comments, President Isaac Herzog issued a call for civility and against polarization.

“While we worry about the abyss of polarization that the election year may bring, we must return to the idea and institution of being statesmanlike,” said Herzog.

The president said Ben-Gurion knew that Israel needed “to think like a nation. To place what is shared above the interest of his own camp.”

Herzog said Israel’s first premier adopted an approach that “commands us to stick together and to reach understandings, agreements, and even decisions — democratically. Not to turn our backs on our brothers and sisters as if they were enemies.”

The president said that there was a distinction in his eyes between unity and brotherhood.

“Brotherhood is the key to healthy political life: It does not erase disagreements, but recognizes that even when we completely disagree about direction, we are still members of the same home,” he said.

As Israel enters an election year — a national vote must be held by October 2026 — Herzog suggested that the nation must remember “that every election ends the next morning. After the election there will be results. Some will rejoice, others will be disappointed. But at a deeper level, this matters less than the question: Will we still be able to look each other in the eye, to live together, to build a shared Israeli tomorrow?”

Wednesday’s remarks were not the first anti-government outburst by Ben-Eliezer at his grandfather’s memorial ceremony.

In 2020, Ben-Gurion’s grandson was part of a group that protested the appearance at the memorial of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The demonstrators, he said at the time, “came from all over the country to express themselves in protest and say, ‘Fuck Netanyahu, and long live Israel.'”