On Channel 12 TV last Friday evening, reporter Almog Boker complained about an item on the Friday night news that dealt with the issue of junior and senior doctors leaving Israel, either permanently or temporarily. The main reason cited for their departure is the danger to liberal democracy that they perceive the current government as posing.
The departure of doctors is assuming worrying dimensions and intensifying the shortage of medical staff in Israel’s hospitals and medical system in general. Boker commented that he considers the decision of these doctors to be unpatriotic, especially in the current reality of an unending war of survival on several fronts.
Boker belongs to those who believe that true patriotism involves remaining in the country, for better or worse. I personally am not grappling with this question because I am too old to consider leaving, and am dependent on my pension and the fruit of the National Insurance paid by me, or on my behalf, since I was 18.
I also still stick by my decision soon after the outbreak of the 1967 Six Day War, that I can have but one home – in Israel. Nevertheless, unless early elections are held soon, and if, once elections are finally held, they are manipulated in such a way that the Center/Left has no chance of winning, I shall have no argument with those who might consider leaving.
I admit that at this stage, most of my concerns regarding the future of Israeli democracy do not touch on my immediate daily existence but rather on more general principles that are likely to change the whole fabric of our democratic existence over time.
However, there are already warning signs that certain elements in my daily life, which directly affect my sense of well-being, are liable to be irreversibly changed in the near future. I am referring particularly to the declared intention of Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi to close down or privatize our public broadcasting network Kan, and encourage the weakening and even closure of the liberal daily Haaretz.
Since the early 1950s, when I was a child, I have listened to the daily news on the public broadcasting station of Kol Yisrael, and nowadays Kan. Since way back when, I have had the radio in my kitchen, and the one in my car, tuned on Kol Hamusica – also part of the Public Broadcasting Corporation – which broadcasts classical music and jazz 24 hours a day.
Karhi argues that public broadcasting is an anomaly in the free market of democratic states. When the Israel Broadcasting Authority (IBA) was replaced by Kan in 2017, then-culture and sports minister Miri Regev argued against the establishment of the new Public Broadcasting Corporation. “What is it worth if we do not control it?” she remarked.
What Karhi and Regev did not – and still do not – understand is that public broadcasting is needed to make sure that broadcast radio and TV content that cannot exist commercially does not disappear; not to serve as a propaganda platform for the ruling government.
This content includes high-quality cultural programs; neutral news and current affairs programs in various languages (including Yiddish and Ladino) and for different communities; classical music; regional stations, etc. Of course, one should constantly seek to improve the quality of this content and ensure equality among the various potential communities of listeners.
Incidentally, if Karhi gets his way, Haaretz – which is particularly critical of the current government – will be pushed out of the market altogether. Already the government has stopped publishing its advertisements in Ha’aretz, and no longer pays for Haaretz subscriptions for civil servants entitled to receive a daily newspaper for free.
Exactly two months ago, in the Knesset plenum, Karhi called on Knesset members from the opposition to start getting their news from the extreme right-wing Channel 14 TV as the most satisfactory alternative for receiving the facts. Indeed, Channel 14 is a legitimate source of news but also a dodgy source of fake news and of frequently unbearable broadcasters who consider it their duty to insult and mock liberals and social democrats, such as myself.
Optimists within the Center/Left hope that Karhi will fail in his efforts. I am not so sure that there is any basis for such optimism, especially since Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has not expressed any public reservations about Karhi’s plans and statements.
But the media is only one of numerous spheres in our lives in which Israel’s liberal democracy seems endangered by the current government’s plans and activities.
If the government’s plans in the spheres of law and justice proceed undeterred; if the improper and even unconstitutional way the government makes major policy decisions continues; if certain government ministers and senior coalition MKs continue to speak out scandalously and irresponsibly on various issues without being called to order; if legitimate demonstrators continue to be treated increasingly harshly – frequently without any justifiable cause – life will become progressively unbearable, even though not everyone will be equally affected.
Add to this the poor quality of several ministers (some of whom head superfluous ministries), the deliberate deterioration of the quality of our professional civil service, the turning of parts of the police force into the personal militia of the national security minister, and the continued deterioration of the Israeli economy, the future looks gloomy.
The situation remains reversible
I still believe that all these realities and trends are reversible and that Israel can get back on a path of changes based on broad agreement, that will make life more bearable for everyone. Nevertheless, anyone who already finds the situation unbearable has the right to leave without being accused of being unpatriotic or even a traitor.
One of the basic rights of the individual in a liberal democracy is the right to emigrate. This right has been used by over half a million Israelis (some estimate the number at as many as 800,000) since the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948. These have included both left- and right-wingers.
The writer worked in the Knesset for many years as a researcher and has published extensively both journalistic and academic articles on current affairs and Israeli politics. Her most recent book, Israel’s Knesset Members – A Comparative Study of an Undefined Job, was published by Routledge.