Yuval Noah Harari on shuttering of Knesset: ‘This is an attempted coup’

Influential Israeli author Yuval Noah Harari writes an op-ed in the Yedioth Ahronoth daily titled: “This is an attempted coup.”

“How do you know that a coup attempt is taking place in the country? It is not easy. No big address appears in the sky ‘Coup!’ The sun continues to shine, children continue to play, people continue to eat. Everything looks normal,” he writes.

“The coronavirus will ultimately pass, whereas we will have to live with the repercussions of decisions that are being made at this point in time for many years to come,” writes Harari, author of the bestseller “Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind.”

“These are decisions about life and death, the limits of our freedom, and the distribution of tens of billions. These decisions are currently being made by one person who is accused of bribery, fraud and breach of trust, and who has failed in the last year in three attempts to gain the trust of the people. And the people’s elected officials do not supervise what this person decides, because that person has disabled the Knesset,” he charges.

“As long as the Knesset isn’t functioning, we are living in a dictatorship,” he adds.