Benjamin Netanyahu posts a “humorous” political video for the Shavuot holiday that shows a man horrifying his liberal parents at the holiday meal by coming out to them as a supporter of the prime minister, when they are merely expecting he is about to tell them he was gay.
As the parents gossip about an acquaintance’s “low-life” son who watches the pro-Netanyahu Channel 14, their son clinks his glass and says: “Mom, Dad, I want to tell you something.”
His pony-tailed father says without batting an eyelash, “You’re gay,” as the mother chides her husband to “let the boy say for himself that he’s gay.” The right-wing man’s sister, tapping away at her phone, scoffs: “Coming out is so 2019.”
Then the son drops his bombshell: “I’m right wing,” he says proudly.
The father, sipping his wine, sputters it out in shock. But, recovering their poise, the parents try to be supportive, with the mother saying, “We’ll get through this together,” and the father suggesting that the deluded son might be referring to anti-Netanyahu opposition party leaders Naftali Bennett or Gadi Eisenkot.
But no, the son stresses that he is a supporter of Netanyahu himself — “I’m a Bibist” — not the prime minister’s right-wing rivals in the opposition. (“Bibist” is a widely used term for supporters of Netanyahu, taken from his nickname “Bibi”.)
The parents turn hysterical, expressing disbelief that he could hold such views despite “reading books” and “working in tech.” The mother faints, her face plunging into her cake, and as the son tries to revive her, the father yells bitterly: “You couldn’t have been gay?”
As the scene concludes, a voiceover intones empathetically: “You’re not alone. Over two million right-wing voters deal every year with discrimination, anger and hate just because of their political views. Look it up on Google: Bibist, not half a human being.”
“Chag Sameach (a happy festival) to everyone,” Netanyahu states in the post, which was uploaded on Instagram and other social media platforms a few hours before Shavuot began on Thursday evening, adding heart and Israeli flag emojis.
Israel is to hold general elections no later than October 27, although the date may be advanced by several weeks. The Knesset this week passed a preliminary reading of a bill to dissolve parliament, but the bill, which would need three more readings to become law, did not set an election date.
