Addenda to the Last Two Columns (Column 545)

Much, much appreciated.

The feelings the rabbi describes from the demonstrations are interesting, but I don’t interpret them that way. In my estimation, the reason they may be somewhat complacent is not because they think that if the reform passes Israel will become an orderly state and a wonderful democracy, but because they don’t believe the reform, in an extreme form, will pass at all. They are of course protesting the possibility and the chance, they are fighting to soften it as much as possible, but they understand that reality is stronger than anything. Israel needs the High Court, and therefore cannot completely neutralize it, just as Israel cannot really annex Area C tomorrow. Reality dictates the main thing; they of course add as much as they can.

That is possible and even likely, and still it means that in their eyes the possibility that the very worst thing they’re crying out against will happen is slim. Which is exactly what I wrote.

One remark, with your permission.
In my opinion there really is a fear of the collapse of democracy. But the fear is 40 years ahead, not in the next 10 years. In addition, this trouble of a semi-democratic regime will probably not be the lot of the Tel Avivians and their descendants. They will always be able (financially, sociologically, and in terms of conscience) to emigrate from here and find themselves temporary or permanent refuge. The trouble will be that of “Second Israel,” those who will have to remain, whether for sociological, economic, or technical reasons.

Yes, but not exactly. I do think that from their point of view (and in my opinion quite rightly), if an extreme reform passes, Israel will become a kind of Hungary, and Hungary and Poland are a very bad thing democratically. It’s just that Israel is not Hungary, and there is no practical possibility of neutralizing the High Court (and in my opinion even Levin’s reform, with somewhat more serious changes, I doubt how realistic it would be to pass—but we shall live and see).

Your conclusion that the protesters are not afraid of the fall of democracy is mistaken. First of all, because in this state of helplessness people live in cognitive dissonance. The significance has not yet fully sunk in. For now, the only effective thing the individual feels he can do is get his money out of Israel, and that’s the conversation at the moment. Yes, the fear is that we will become Hungary, but beyond going out to demonstrate and making sure there is an escape route, what else can one do?

In my opinion the current situation is the product of irresponsibility on both sides; that is, the aggressive manner of the legislation is undoubtedly the result of unfair conduct by the High Court—for example, in the lack of equal representation (in the past there was justification because of underdevelopment, but in recent decades that claim has been losing its force)—and this caused those who feel deprived, once they had the ability, to act immoderately.
Something similar happened in the media, in my opinion: the main media channels reported, morning and evening, in a biased way against Netanyahu’s government, for example, and refrained from any justified criticism of the opposition (I know this personally), which caused the dreadful Channel 14 (in my opinion) to open.
Had they behaved more moderately, apparently all this would not have happened.

By the way, Netanyahu, despite his very many flaws, is, as is known, a pragmatic person and distinctly anti-messianic (unlike the messianics on the right and the left), and in my estimation he is the last person who ever wanted to neutralize the High Court, not even a little bit, all for many reasons:
A. Ideologically (as much as one can ascribe ideology to that cynical man)
B. Practically on the internal level—the High Court has done, does, and will do a great deal of the work that he wants done but not in his name
C. Practically on the international level: the UN, The Hague, the IDF’s control in the territories, international image, etc. etc.
And in my estimation here too, the reason he is “promoting” reform now is only as a tool to bring moderate centrist figures like Lapid and Gantz into the coalition (to break up the “Anyone but Bibi” boycott), and then, along the way, to water down the reform or most of it and throw out the messianics and Kahanists on the right. Time will tell, but that is my assessment.

You had a statement that you published in synagogues before the last elections. I assume whoever put up the money for that publication put up quite a lot of money, and my impression is that the number of readers who read your words from beginning to end was small. In the synagogue in Jerusalem where I prayed, I hardly saw people looking at it. Of course, I was sorry about that. So at least in that initiative you tried to address a broad audience in your long lecture-style manner, and in my estimation without success. Didn’t you foresee that?? Do you think I’m mistaken?

Roni,
Apology fully accepted. 🙂
What Gadi Taub in his latest book called “the mobile ones.” But for some reason Second Israel is not part of the protest. Beyond that, I think that even among the mobile ones, a significant fear of the collapse of democracy would have evoked a much harsher reaction. Even wealthy and mobile people would be very afraid of being forced to emigrate.

N,
I completely agree. I would also add his desire to be remembered as a good and successful prime minister (a historical consciousness he got from his father). As for his motives, I am too small for that. I think his coalition is pressuring him and he has no choice. They too are fed up with the fact that he has been stopping them for many years in right-wing governments.

Well, maybe. Doesn’t sound likely to me.

I completely agree with all this, and I wrote it too.

It’s hard for me to say. I’m not prepared to address a broad audience at the expense of precision and detail. In my view it is much more important to speak to the elites.

As for the complacency, from my limited vantage point I see alertness and clear-eyed planning of various options, even if people are not groaning and walking around gloomily. The judicial reform is a light blow to the wing; greater than it is the renewed understanding of who and what is stirring within the Jewish people in the Holy Land, and what its power and plans are. Even if there is a five percent chance of a deep pit of mud, then a reasonable person (if he is not a hero) needs to formulate a backup plan for himself and his family. [By the way, somewhat related: lately I’ve again noticed that there is something deceptive about a radical pessimist who sees reality take a step toward the dystopia he has been predicting for years, and then smiles with satisfaction and expects that now everyone will acknowledge the correctness of his principled analysis and also join his forecast and his practical guidance. It’s like when there is a difficulty and no answer, and then someone comes along with a shaky answer, and the choice is either to have no answer or to go with the implausible answer.]

Hello Rabbi,

I really like the sharp style that conveys the message well without political correctness.

One thing bothered me in the previous column: you called Miri Regev stupid.

While I loathe her, her behavior, and her decisions (and I will never forget her for publicizing the expulsion from Gush Katif), to call her stupid goes beyond the rule you gave here regarding labels (after all, a “moron” is someone whose sex is unknown).

There it was clearly just a derogatory nickname.

It comes from the tendency in the soul to try to “be like everyone else.” Something that apparently exists in Michi—“to be like everyone else” (at least in certain things).

There is criticism of Regev, but she does not deserve to be called that.

And it’s a great shame that you support ugly discourse that corrupts the soul, and is really on the verge of violence.

“Substantive discourse without political correctness, or quiet discourse about political correctness”

Why a false dichotomy?

Why not substantive discourse with political correctness?

If you had read the column, you would have understood why this is not a false dichotomy.

Michi, regarding the use of harsh expressions:
I learned from my teacher and rabbi, Rabbi M. Z. Neria, to focus on the matter itself and not on the person.
And I myself think this way; first, in this way the degree of sharpness is to the writer’s taste,
and from this it follows that the sharpness in the expressions can be positive, and it would be difficult to attach condemnation to them.

The style is less interesting.
What is interesting is whether the content of your words represents thinking that seeks to clarify the truth, or, as it appears, thinking intended to serve your survival in the society in which you are found.
Can you rely on yourself at all?
What chiefly characterizes your words is intellectual and critical surrender to those who determine your salary and your academic status.
The hair-splitting and philosophizing are meant to distract the reader (and also yourself) from the bitter truth that you are compelled to think as you think. Not that the truth compels you. Rather, your careerist survival does.

You are entirely tainted by self-interest, and there is no reason at all to rely on your words on matters that concern you personally. Exactly as one cannot rely on any other person in a similar situation.

More power to you. Still, criticism of the content and not of the person is important.
As for the length, a middle way would be worthwhile—not too short and not too long—and I understood your explanation.

I would add what my friend Rabbi Dr. משה רט wrote on the subject:
The Gemara relates (Avodah Zarah 20a) that when Rabbi Akiva saw the wife of Turnus Rufus, he spat, laughed, and cried. He spat—because she came from a putrid drop. He laughed—because he saw that she was destined to convert and marry him. And he cried—over her beauty, which was destined to decay in the earth.

Rabbi Yosef Yehuda Leib Bloch, in his book Shiurei Da’at, brings this as an illustration of the capacity of elevated people to experience simultaneously strong emotions of different kinds, relating to the different aspects of the reality before them. A simple person is emotionally capable of focusing on only one aspect, and of being either happy, or sad, or angry, etc.—but not all together. Rabbi Akiva, by contrast, was able to encompass in his vision the full range of aspects: the lowliness of physicality, the tidings of the anticipated marriage, and the appreciation of beauty and the sorrow over its unavoidable loss—and to experience in full intensity all the emotions involved, despite the seeming contradiction between them. He did not see this as a contradiction but as a complement. And this recalls Chesterton’s words, according to which the right way is not a compromise between different extremes but the full expression of both at the same time—so that they naturally balance one another without losing their force.

When one understands this, one understands that it is indeed possible to experience seemingly contradictory emotions at the same time: for example, if disaster comes upon an enemy state, one can simultaneously rejoice and give thanks for the downfall of the wicked, and weep and have compassion for the innocents suffering there. One can love a certain person and at the same time hate and abhor his deeds. Not everyone is capable of this, and therefore many prefer to focus only on one emotion and deny the place of the other. But for a great person there will be room in the soul for both emotions simultaneously, without having to give up either of them. In our generation people talk a lot about “complexity,” but this word is often used to justify compromise, blurring, and evasion of decision. True complexity is that which does not evade or blur, but rather expresses all the aspects in full.

And one can, of course, also be devoid of feeling and feel nothing at all toward such situations. That too is an option, and it saves many problems and heartaches.

I think this is a response that emotion has taken over.

If there is someone who cannot be accused of “wanting to be like everyone else,” it is Rabbi Michi.

When the Greek historian Polybius would analyze wars and their causes, he would distinguish between the pretext for a war and the reason for it. There is a real reason, which is sometimes not presented and sometimes not even conscious, and there is a pretext, meaning the excuse for starting the war.

The struggle against the reform is supposedly about the independence of the judiciary, but that is nonsense. It is obvious to everyone that if all the Supreme Court justices were in the mold of Noam Sohlberg or Yosef Elron, they would not be fighting for the court’s independence, and it is very likely that we would see the opposite struggle.

These people feel, and to no small extent justly, that the state is being stolen from them. They served the state, contribute to its economy, and are proud of its liberal values. And now a new government arises that represents everything they find loathsome: religious fundamentalism, hatred toward those different from me, directing enormous resources to unproductive sectors while reinforcing the trend. Their country is disappearing from them.

And the only body that, in their understanding, can stand against the trend is the High Court, which over the years has been made up of enlightened people, represented liberal positions, and established itself as a body that takes positions on political issues and serves as a counterweight to the government. The new government also understands this situation, and therefore charges like an enraged bull at this judicial establishment.

So the struggle is not over the judicial system out of a need for checks and balances. The protesters, some consciously and some unconsciously, want to ensure not only that there will be brakes, but that their foot is the one placed on them.

One can completely understand their fear, and one can completely understand the other side. There is no avoiding reaching a compromise.

Hello there,
In my opinion you should reconsider your view and your style regarding the Haredim.
After all, you studied at Midrashiat Noam and at Yeshivat Netivot Olam.
That is to say, you yourself are Haredi, and if so then you yourself are a parasite.
It doesn’t look as though you work in agriculture or construction.
In my opinion, whoever does not work in agriculture or construction is a parasite.
And therefore it is a shame to insult the Jews; it is just antisemitism for its own sake and worthless.
The gentiles gained no benefit at all from antisemitism—on the contrary, only harm.
All the more so antisemitic Jews.
In my opinion you should apologize.
Many people, including myself, were offended by your words.

Uriel, “a middle way would be worthwhile—not too short and not too long”—what kind of thing is that?? This isn’t salads. One person will think it’s a bit long and another will think it’s too short, etc.; it’s a matter of taste, so there’s nothing to recommend. The rabbi should do what he likes to do, and only that way will it come out well. Whoever finds it long can skip it; whoever doesn’t, won’t.
Authors are not supposed to present the book to the reader in such a way that he will want to read it. That has to stem purely from the reader’s own desire.
And to my personal taste, a hundred times better long but well explained and well understood, with different formulations and different emphases and repetition in other words etc., than short and pointed when nobody really understood anything.

The rabbi makes a verbal analogy between Haredi demonstrations, where violence and intoxication of the senses rule, and a demonstration by an educated and level-headed public that recoils from violence.
The public opposing the Bibist madness will not go out to a civil war because that is not its character (of course there may be isolated violent individuals, but so far it is easy to see which side is the violent one).

At the moment there is still a struggle, and that is what enrages the Bibists, but there will be a point at which people lose hope and develop indifference.
When that happens, we won’t see a struggle by might and spirit, but a slow leakage outward of a public that has lost interest in the state.
As in marriage, the problem is not quarrels but the point at which people arrive at indifference, and then there is no way back.

It only proves that your friends, the rabbis and female rabbis of Israel the 3rd from Gush Etzion, as usual go out of their minds being hysterical when it’s about the whites from Ramat HaSharon.

Note the gap between the incitement of the demonstration organizers (Huldai, Olmert and company), who explicitly call for violence (a few decades ago Yeshayahu Leibowitz explicitly called for civil war and added that he would take an active part in it were it not for his advanced age), and the calm atmosphere of the demonstrators, as Michi himself describes. For some reason, neither you nor he considers that there is another explanation for this gap, namely that many of the demonstrators simply did not want to be there and were forced to come by threats (more gentle or less gentle) to their sources of livelihood. I myself know quite a few such people. This is not at all a struggle for democracy and human rights, but a simple and crude struggle over power centers. In particular, over the last unelected center of power left to the Left after it lost all hope of winning the people’s trust in democratic elections. (In the 1980s some of the leaders of the Labor Alignment said this almost explicitly. I do not have quotations and sources at hand right now, but I was there and heard it).

As for Michi’s last three columns, I intentionally did not comment. Disgusting and not worthy of a response. The poor man has gone crazy and gotten deranged. A shame, but not surprising. I already pointed out on this very site that this is a known phenomenon: philosophers and scientists (on a level incomparably higher than Michi) who, as a result of some urological problem, thought they understood everything about everything. Some enthusiastically supported Stalin and others Hitler. Thus, for example, the Nazi flag flew over Harvard University in Cambridge (near Boston) until America entered the war, and its then president declared that no Jew would ever set foot there. That did not prevent those professors from thinking of themselves as prophets of progress, morality, and freedom. How happy I was a few decades ago to trample Harvard’s soil under my feet (at its expense!) and that antisemite’s promise, in one step… In any case, we learned that expertise in one field, or even several, does not make you an expert on the problems of the people and the times any more than any ordinary person.

The members of the “only Bibi” cult live in a world of lies, and any datum that doesn’t fit them—they force reality to accept a picture that will confirm the lie within which they live.

No one comes to a demonstration by coercion among the sane public.
But a crazed Bibist cannot bear the thought that there is a public whose opinion differs from your idolatry, and so consoles himself that they are all coerced and really would like to join him in a mighty song of “Bibi king of Israel.”

Perhaps one can judge favorably and say that in this case the Bibist sees from the thoughts of his own heart—I remember how during my yeshiva years they would load all of us onto buses and send us to demonstrations like sheep without an opinion.
Whoever refused to get on the bus was told that the demonstration was part of the curriculum, and if he did not like it he was welcome to leave the yeshiva…

So calm your mind—among the sane public there is no ideological or religious coercion.
There is also no single leader for the holy congregation, neither a rebbe nor Bibi.

Everyone leads himself according to his own understanding.

Nothing is sane about this public. Your religion (the progressive religion in which there is no objective reality, and which is the religion of all leftists today—consciously or unconsciously) is the most fanatical, irrational, and dangerous religion ever created. By definition, this is a public of mentally ill people. And the religious coercion there is the strongest there is. I was there too. Ostensibly there is no rebbe, because this is a religion that works, among other things, for empty individualism. There is nevertheless a rebbe—the hollow and empty scarecrow Lapid.
Not in all high-school yeshivas was there coercion to come to demonstrations.

“The sane public,” “members of the only-Bibi cult.” Well, well. With such profound arguments, who can cope?
“Among the sane public there is no ideological or religious coercion.” You have an excellent sense of humor, my friend. Apparently you are a young fellow and do not know the history of the kibbutz movement, nor the split that took place within it (families were torn apart, partitions were erected in kibbutz dining halls, etc.), and you do not know the “red notebook,” which was an absolute condition for making a living. (My late father also had one, although he loathed socialism and Mapai with all his heart. The notebook is still kept by my mother, may she live long.) I have many relatives in the kibbutzim of the north whom I first met in my life at my wedding. In my childhood their parents would not allow them to meet us lest we spoil the fervor of their innocent faith in socialism…
Well then, there definitely were people who came to the demonstration out of concern for their livelihood. How many? I don’t know. But there are indications that their number is not negligible at all. You can continue telling yourself that you are part of “the sane public” and that everything is wonderful in the socialist/democratic/sane/progressive paradise you created for yourself in your imagination. I feel sorry for you on the day you wake up (like some of my relatives from that branch of the family did, on the day Khrushchev’s speech at the 20th Congress of the Communist Party was published).

First of all, Noam Sohlberg too is an activist. He is not conservative in legal terms (it’s simply judges’ ego). The thought that an unelected body (that chooses itself) will impose policy on the elected representatives of the Jewish people and try to educate the Jewish people at the cost of shedding Jewish blood over human-rights matters of those who behave like animals is intolerable. The reason people are charging at this body is that for many years it prevented the IDF from fighting and brought about the deaths of many Jews, and in the end also Gush Katif (because it did not allow the IDF to fight the residents of Gaza as a hostile collective. And in the end the human-rights issues of the evacuees didn’t interest it either. Imagine if they had tried to evacuate 8,000 Arab-Israeli settlers to the Palestinian Authority. Right-wingers have no human rights with them.)

For years the Left did not allow the Right to advance at all in productive jobs, and also in government positions, beginning from Ben-Gurion’s time (he hated Begin most of all. And the Left also continued to hate him—“Begin murderer”). The Haredim once, the overwhelming majority of them, went out to work and also went to the army, but because of the religious persecutions they withdrew into themselves (the yeshivas were “Noah’s arks,” in the language of the Hazon Ish). And these are exactly their students. They were never obliged to give citizenship to the Haredim (and then it would also have been possible to forgo citizenship for Arabs. But oh no, that is the holy of holies of the Left—citizenship for the enemies of the Jewish people), and they went so far that today, subconsciously or consciously, they no longer have loyalty to the Jewish people (only to the state, which is a state of all its citizens, not the state of the Jewish people).

And on the contrary, the more the religious (and right-wing) public was more Zionist, enlisted more in the army, and succeeded more in academia, the more they hated it.
This is simply a religion that is a continuation and development of the communist religion, which hates all other religions with a deadly hatred. Its rebbes were the heads of academia and the judges from the days of Aharon Barak. What can you do—such people, who in their hearts have seceded from the Jewish people, have nothing to seek in this country.

Gabriel, this is an astonishingly optimistic and tendentious description. There are cults on both sides, as I have written several times. And there are definitely influences and demagoguery and lack of listening and preaching on both sides.

Indeed, much appreciated

But there’s something strange in the rabbi’s description.
Several Saturday nights, instead of sitting comfortably for “Fathers and Sons,” immediately after Havdalah I drive from home (some settlement somewhere) to the demonstration near the President’s residence in Jerusalem (more than an hour there and back)
There are a few thousand there
And in my estimation every Saturday night close to half, and maybe only a third, are religious (very few Haredim really)

So the rabbi’s claim that there are no religious people there is really strange…
We are much less than a third or half of the people of Israel, and at the Saturday-night demonstrations we are between a third and a half…

There’s also no picnic on Saturday night…
Simply nothing, not even water…
I get home and then have “Melaveh Malkah”

Bad luck that I am,
I should have gone on Monday and not on Saturday night

Mordechai, you continue projecting your delusions onto others.
Socialism? Is there more socialism than Bibi/Haredim/Hardalim?
You have established here a socialist paradise in which a person can avoid working a single day from birth to old age while the working public pays for him for daycare/education/healthcare, and then goes further and adds birth grants, child allowances, kollel stipends, and food vouchers…

Very impressive, the story of the red notebook and the kibbutzim at the founding of the state that I did not merit to know.
But if you need to go back 70 years to find supporting evidence, then apparently even through the screen of Bibist madness you are able to grasp that there is no coercion among the sane public, and it exists entirely in your own home.

In my lifetime I have met kibbutzniks, Meretz voters, hi-tech people, religious, Hardalim, and Haredim—and the only ones who were careful to keep a camp clean of all foreign influence were the Haredim, and after them in descending order the Hardalim and the religious.

Could you please elaborate and demonstrate who came to the demonstration under coercion?
Or will you continue claiming that the demonstrations were organized by aliens / the New Israel Fund / the Illuminati / the Freemasons?

Every person has a right to an opinion of his own, but only the feeble-minded reserve for themselves the right to facts of their own.

Does the rabbi accept the claim that people came to the demonstration under coercion?
Because there is a fellow here speaking from personal knowledge with conclusive proof about coerced people dragged to the demonstration by kibbutzniks carrying red notebooks.

He doesn’t really mean coercion. But clearly there were social and other pressures, as in every society.
Mordechai, as is his way, gets carried away in the heat of the discussion and excited by his arguments. No need to take it too seriously.

Wipe the foam from your lips, drink a glass of cold water, lean back, breathe deeply and slowly, and with God’s help the attack will pass.

“You established here a socialist paradise.” To whom are your honored words directed? My deeds are poor and few. I have never established either paradise or hell. Sorry. (And I am not Haredi at all, not a Likud member, and I have never voted Likud in my life.) Dragging the discussion into stupid ad hominem does not add points for you.
“The sane public” is only a new mask for the old lady who once called herself “the progressive public,” “the enlightened public,” etc. The world goes on in its usual way. I noted that I do not have precise statistics and breakdowns of the demonstrators, but there are indications. One of them is the picnic and happening atmosphere described by Michi. Whoever comes “to fight for ____” (fill in the blank) does not come to a picnic. There may be all sorts of reasons, and I mentioned one possible one. Another possible reason is that some demonstrators do indeed oppose the reform, but know very well that the atmosphere of hysteria and “the end of democracy” is artificial and staged, except that the occasion requires it. Others perhaps simply used it as recreation on work time. Whatever the reason may be, whoever comes “to fight” does not hold picnics. (By the way, my daughter happened by mistake into a demonstration in Jerusalem, and her impression was similar.) Therefore I am also not impressed by threats of civil war. Bogie Ya’alon, Huldai, Olmert, and the rest of the Napoleons will not sacrifice their budgetary pensions. Of course, that does not exempt the authorities from the duty to put them on trial for incitement to violence.

And regarding Michi’s “sweeping” remark below—a further splendid display of self-awareness.

It’s an aesthetic matter; it’s not pleasant to hear that kind of speech. It creates an atmosphere of anger and forcefulness. I don’t think it is good in any way or conveys a message more powerfully. One can write, “this is a very great mistake and Rabbi Eliyahu is failing in his role,” and not say “idiot” and use derogatory epithets. It has nothing to do with PC; it’s simply more pleasant that way. It’s just hard because you’re angry—but to turn that into a method?
As I see it, a system of government is an expression of the character of the people who live in the country. Even if there were no state judicial system at all, the cards and the boundaries would rearrange themselves and we would simply end up more or less at the same point. It may take a few years, but it would sort itself out. Just as the Arabs would remain with their mentality even if formally they had a democracy. What do you think?

Today my wife, who is wise and educated, behaved in a very stupid way. Does the rabbi think I can tell her that she is stupid, and if so, in a similar situation would the rabbi also act that way with his wife?

Yonatan, all the people see the thunder—how do you not see?
After all, the way has already been proposed—a war of brothers!
By the way, it would be interesting to know what our Rabbi Michael would call Huldai, Gantz, and Hudak, who are threatening a war of brothers.
And yes, above all, Aharon Barak, who is prepared to stand before the firing squad.

A response to the unparalleled fool—
You wrote, “Minister Smotrich… Michi, you are stupid.”
You have switched the method. The sentence is correct—the names were switched.

A response to the last pursing-of-lips posek,
You write, “What characterizes your words is…”
I looked in his words for something that hints at the things you wrote. There is no such characteristic in his words.
This is your invention. Mere belly-thought.
If you want to speak—speak about the matter, not about the person writing.
I hope you understand that with this claim you will not be able to persuade the rabbi, nor any sensible reader.

A response to A.A.A.
Before you ask how the rabbi would behave, tell us how your wife behaves
when you (wise and educated like her) behave in a stupid way.

Since people have different opinions, and as a result may trouble and harm one another, it is easy to see the shortcomings of the other and defend ourselves against them so that they should not, Heaven forbid, cause harm. This is the middling side of human discourse, whose clearest expression is political discourse, or mass communication. Of such discourse it is said: there is nothing new under the sun. True conversation does not come from a place of condescension and opinionatedness, but from a place of listening and hearing. Thus Rabbi Elimelech of Lizhensk would pray: “Put into our hearts that each of us may see the good qualities of our fellows and not their faults, and that each of us may speak to his fellow in the upright and desirable way before You, and let no hatred arise in any person toward his fellow, God forbid.”

I have no interest in worrying about aesthetics. If there is an atmosphere of anger, it is entirely justified. I really am angry, and the wording expresses that very well.
By your method, there is no need for laws and systems at all. Everything works out in the end. How does it work out? Among other things, by our legislating.

I explained everything in the column. I don’t see a question here.

The reason is that whoever sees clearly the existing legal proceedings knows that today the High Court, the legal counsel, the police, and the prosecution are places that are dishonest and unequal toward the public of the right, the Haredim, and the Jews.

Therefore, those who participate in the demonstrations are those who—or whose positions—receive disproportionate preference in the judicial system = the old Ashkenazi socialist secular nationalist elite (actually, the “nationalist” letter can already be erased; even the non-Zionists receive preference).

The rest hope that changing the judicial system will bring more equality.

I know the writer is a religious person, but this old elite is a cultural reference group, which also includes Mizrahim who identify with this culture.

I haven’t seen the full quotations and their context. But to the best of my understanding, they did not threaten a war of brothers. They expressed concern about reaching such a situation. They also said there are situations in which it is justified to take such a course (and the fear is that we may reach them). That is entirely correct.
That statement of Aharon Barak’s is idiotic.

The issue is not the present. If the judicial reform passes and becomes an economic and social disaster, then in the next elections there will be a left-wing majority with the Arabs, and they will cancel everything. But in another 40 or 50 years, the demography will already be too Haredi, and there will be no place in the country for someone who is not Haredi, because the Haredim are overbearing and take no one into account but themselves. The reason people are not in a panic is that one cannot be in a panic over things that will happen only in another 40 years. It is a psychological mechanism of repression that also prevents us from dealing every day with the thought that in the end we will die.

Your description of the demonstration sounds quite accurate, but I don’t think it means that people aren’t worried. In Hungary it took some time until they reached the condition they are in today (young Hungarians don’t want to live in Hungary today, and can emigrate relatively easily since Hungary is part of the Union). When one talks to other people, it seems that everyone understands the danger.
Just to be precise: for me the danger is not only that the government will be able to do whatever it wants in accordance with some “right-wing” ideology (such as imprisoning all the refugees, annexing the territories without granting equal rights to the Palestinians, arresting left-wing lecturers and executing them, etc.), but first and foremost corruption. Already now we see that the government first of all wants to pass laws that will benefit members of the government, and time after time they run into the High Court or the legal advisers (the various Deri laws, the law that a Likud MK wants to pass allowing public officials to receive donations from wealthy friends, and other things in the pipeline, I assume). There is also smaller corruption that is very harmful, such as appointing cronies or benefits for associates. There is more and more.
In such a corrupt state, it is hard to believe that people will continue investing as they do today in academia and industry, which are truly magnificent by any standard, and young people with democratic consciousness, ability, and skills will simply flee (it is easier to emigrate when you are young and healthy, and it is also easy to go abroad for a fellowship and not return). Of course there is also the fear that the government could, if it wishes, nationalize companies or funds without any oversight. This is the beginning of a deterioration whose end one can only imagine.
So people are taking concrete steps: they do demonstrate, but they invest their savings and pensions abroad instead of in Israel, and some also transfer funds to foreign banks, because it is better to play it safe. That in itself also harms the economy, of course, and leads to further outflow of money, etc.

The situation here reminds me of the situation in England: they voted for Brexit in a referendum based on lies (and won by a very small majority), and now their economy is in very bad shape and many of those who voted in favor regret it. That is, they got themselves into a mess for no good reason, and now everyone suffers as a result. That is what is going to happen here if this “reform” passes as it is.

Hungary, Hungary, Hungary. They scare the public with some demon speaking a language stressed on the first syllable unlike any other language in the world, so the public cannot really follow what is actually going on in that country, and the agents of ignorance and progressivism can play with the consciousness of the masses as they wish.
Well then, as a Hungarian citizen who speaks Hungarian and follows what is happening in Hungary, I can tell you that it is all fake news (nyavalyás). Hungary is a model democracy. All the scare stories are the rotten fruit of the filthy money of a despicable little Jew named George Soros, may his name and memory be erased (formerly György Schwartz, who once boasted in a television interview that he used to strip Jewish corpses in the Budapest ghetto and loot what was on them, and described it as the best time of his life!!!), who also generously funds subversive foundations in Israel. If only Israel were as democratic as Hungary. May it be so.
By the way, Hungary is among the few countries in the world where a Jew need not fear walking in public with Jewish appearance and dress. In “liberal” democracies such as Germany, England, Sweden, etc., it is advisable not to make your Jewishness stand out in public and not to speak Hebrew loudly. That could be dangerous.

Mordechai, I belong to that same group (very small, in my opinion) of idiots who fail to form a decisive and sweeping opinion for or against the judicial reform. Your firm assertion that Hungary is a “model democracy” intrigued me.
You owe me nothing, but since you presented yourself as knowledgeable, I will ask you about several democratic parameters that are probably also accepted by you, and which, to your understanding, exist in Hungary:

Effective separation of powers,
formal-legal and practical protection of human and civil rights,
relatively low level of corruption,
freedom of expression and a free press,
a principled policy of the government to resolve internal conflicts by peaceful means.

Do you understand Hungary’s condition on these parameters to be as good as (or even better than) declared democracies (including Israel)?

By the way, Gadi Taub spent about two weeks there as the guest of some academic institution with the aim, at least according to him, of understanding the situation. In an interview I heard him say that although it’s not as bad as all that, it’s also not as quiet as all that… meaning there are anti-democratic limitations in that country, limitations that even he himself does not like.
Forgive me for turning to you on such a marginal issue.

You asked properly, and therefore I will try to answer properly.

Separation of powers: the question is what you call “effective”? Fidesz won an enormous majority in parliament (about two thirds). So one can say that the government and parliament are one and the same. On the other hand, such a large majority in elections that no one claims were unfair indicates that the people support Orban and his party and are satisfied with their conduct. If democracy is first and foremost “rule by consent of the governed” (Popper, if I recall correctly), then this is as democratic as can be. Indeed, there were claims that Orban “engineered” the electoral districts so as to receive an artificial majority. But these are nonsense claims, because in such a system you can “steal” at most a few percentage points of the votes (which may be critical in the event of a tie or near tie), but you cannot “engineer” a two-thirds majority at the ballot boxes by changing the boundaries of electoral districts. The Hungarian people simply grew tired of dictates from Brussels regarding immigration policy, forced progressive brainwashing in schools, monetary policy dictated from Berlin, and more. (Hungary, like the Czech Republic and several other Eastern European states, did not agree to give up its national currency, the forint, upon joining the European Union—and thus was saved from the bitter fate of the Greek economy.)

In Hungary there is an independent judicial system that functions well. The police there too are much more efficient and service-oriented toward the citizen than the police in Israel. (I saw this myself.) The fact is that no one claims that regime opponents are “disappeared” there, as in the USSR or South American dictatorships. If you are destined to stand trial and the choice is in your hands between an Israeli judge and a Hungarian one—the Hungarian is preferable!

A great deal of fake news has been spread regarding freedom of the press in Hungary. What the law there requires is to report the truth and not spread lies under the guise of “commentary,” like the propaganda channels in Israel. You lied—you pay! You spread false reports—you pay! This applies in particular to state media owned by the government. There is no reason that the Hungarian taxpayer should fund hostile progressive propaganda in the service of foreign states directed from Brussels and Berlin. But it is certainly permitted to spread opinions and polemics against the government, and this happens every day. It is also permitted to demonstrate, and there were huge demonstrations in Budapest against the government. No one tried to interfere, no one tried to block buses, and there were no mass arrests of girls until the end of proceedings, etc. (ring a bell?). The government acts lawfully according to the majority it won in elections. Is that called “peaceful means”? In my opinion, yes.

There is corruption all over the world, including in democracies. It is a human trait and not necessarily a regime trait, though one should remember that under communism you could not survive if you were not corrupt, and it may be difficult to free oneself from such a legacy. The bureaucracy in Hungary is very inefficient (my experiences in government offices in Budapest could have supported several books and films by the late Franz Kishont…). But inefficiency due to the heritage of the communist regime is still not corruption, and I was impressed that the government acts energetically to streamline the governmental apparatus and introduce Western standards into it. (The embassy in Tel Aviv demonstrates this.) Personally I did not encounter corruption in Hungary, but of course that proves nothing. In any case, I do not think Hungary today is more corrupt than England or Germany, for example.

So is everything paradise? No. There is antisemitism (which I did indeed encounter personally), and there is alcoholism, and there are other ugly phenomena as well (as stated, some of them a communist legacy). But the government fights all these with full vigor, and as I noted there is no fear of walking around in Jewish dress in Hungary. One can argue about Hungary’s press laws (cf. Taub, whom you mentioned), but it is simply not true that there is no freedom of speech there. One must remember that some of the restrictions on freedom of expression in Hungary (to the extent they even exist) concern restrictions on antisemitic propaganda. Interesting who wants to remove them, and why.

What angered the progressives who control the European Union was mainly Hungary’s insistence on not allowing itself to be flooded by millions of Muslim “refugees” who would forever change its demography and unique culture, and the government’s insistence on not exposing kindergarten and elementary-school children to LGBT and queer brainwashing. These decisions (mainly, though there are several others) opened the gates of the fake-news media hell of the West against Hungary.

And one more thing that testifies more about the people and less about the government (perhaps), but is worth noting. Once I walked with my daughter for about a kilometer along the main street of Budapest (Károly Boulevard), and we counted more than ten large bookstores and a few small ones as well! (Serious ones, not only cookbooks and comics…). In Athens, for example (city of philosophers!), I saw only one bookstore in the entire city (and I roamed around it a lot). If there is supply, there is probably demand; otherwise the merchants would go bankrupt, and vice versa. How many bookstores are there on the main street of Tel Aviv?

Thank you for the response. I get the impression that the situation there, at least through your eyes, reflects a cultural and governmental “heaviness” drawn from the old Eastern European communist spirit. A kind of healthy conservatism (partly) that is somewhat lacking in Western Europe and North America. Perhaps because there it encounters much more blatant progressive militancy. And perhaps here too are the differences between us and them that require us to take them into account. Democracy has different interpretations and different expressions, and not all of them suit every country. Here I may perhaps connect a little to the criticism of people like you of the Israeli “left,” driven by a self-righteous zeal to enforce its enlightenment—sometimes genuine enlightenment—on a somewhat more complex reality.

You didn’t address at all what I wrote, except for one small line about Hungary.

Regarding that:
So one starts with “What do you mean, we’re not on the way to becoming Hungary,” and ends with “Hungary is actually wonderful.” I also liked the reference to George Soros. The description of the law that forbids media outlets to spread “lies” sounds horrible—do you believe what you are writing? Who determines what “fake news” is? Allow me to guess that it is not an objective and independent body.

There is more than enough available information online about what happened to Hungary, and links can be provided or you can find them yourself. For example, the universities and the media are under the government’s total control (that is, the ruling party’s). The facts are that young people mostly do not want to live there, and during Orban’s rule a great many people left Hungary. The facts are that the Hungarian economy is now suffering from 26 percent inflation, compared with 9 percent in Germany.

But yes, one can walk with a kippah in the street—that’s good to know.

By the way, in England and Germany you can also do that, and certainly speak Hebrew.

I only want to say that in my opinion “conservatism,” as a label for homophobia and propaganda against trans people etc., is in many ways a way to cover over an inability to deal with real problems that bother real citizens, and to occupy citizens with imaginary problems involving an enemy that is easy to hate (did someone mention George Soros?).

Indeed, there is a lot of fake news on the internet, and “the universities and the media are under the government’s total control” is a fine example. But that is simply not true. The Central European University (an institution funded almost entirely by Soros) continues to operate in Budapest (I have a friend who serves there as a professor of mathematics). What the government said is that it is not obligated to fund, from taxpayers’ money, gender studies, queer studies, and other progressive garbage. But whoever wants to study and pay out of his own pocket (or from Soros’s money)—by all means. And as far as I’m concerned, that is perfectly fine. That is why the government received the people’s trust—among other things, to decide what to spend their money on and what not to.

You say there is a lot of material online, but you “guess” that whoever determines what fake news is is a non-objective body. Interesting.

I tried to be fair and pointed out that not everything is paradise, and I gave examples. All I came to say is that the demon depicted here exists only in the imagination of a few progressive leftists. The reality is entirely different, and I know the reality there directly.

As for Soros—this is one of the most vile and loathsome antisemites in the world today, and he himself does not try to hide it. The fact that he is of Jewish origin only intensifies my disgust toward him.

I could elaborate further, but I don’t have time. There is a lot of noise about young people emigrating from Hungary, and there may be something to it (after all, why shouldn’t people try to live in a richer country?), but I have not seen statistics confirming that it is an exodus, as they try to portray it.

Itai, I don’t know whether your words were directed at me, but if so they missed the target. Conservatism is not homophobia, though it is true that among homophobes you will find many more conservatives (and even more reactionaries). Perhaps what defines a conservative in my eyes more than anything else is not his commitment to an ideology or to the practice derived from it, but his attempt to emphasize, not always successfully, the deepest foundations at the basis of human life: intuition, common sense, life experience, self-criticism, tradition, humor, self-deprecating humor, and more and more. In the context of the proposed judicial reform in Israel, perhaps such a definition would actually help you in criticizing its enthusiastic supporters like Levin and Rothman. As I said, I belong to the party of idiots who have not formed a decisive position on the issue, but I am not convinced that our reformers are all that conservative (in the positive senses I described here).

Hello,
A few comments:
1. First, the reliance on the online dictionary Milog is doubly laughable.

A. Milog is the handiwork of Rubik Rosenthal “the son”; like his father, they do not trouble themselves, unlike the windbags and cliffs of ancient language, to investigate the meanings of words and their true and apt interpretation. Their main occupation is the culture of “slang,” with terms or curses of the native-born Israeli in all his shades, the slipping of foreign words into Hebrew, and so on, and that is the end of their expertise.
So a sharply worded and blunt opinion piece, however much directed at important things, which relies “retroactively” on a flimsy online dictionary—such things create autumnal discomfort.

B. And unrelated to this pure source: there are words which, even if they have meaning and a connection to the expression, still are not right to use. For example, the word “traitor”—had it not been directed at Mr. Rabin, it would long ago have become commonplace, but it is still a word that many claim led to murder, and here and there people refrain from using it. The same applies to the epithet “parasite,” which before and after everything else is a creeping creature that sucks blood. And it was very common in Nazi Germany.
True, Milog in its golden tongue will explain that there are people who in general mean other things by it, but that is precisely the point. Who are those people? Golani soldiers, prisoners and drug addicts, or the service people at Oved’s sabich stand? Failed former politicians trying to shake the table and scraping the bottom?
I am not innovating anything for the rabbi by saying that word artists and writers of lethal and celebrated criticism who lived here—Kurtzweil, Haim Gamzu of the famous “legamzo” pun, and in our time also Ra’anan Shaked of Yediot, who does it excellently, and many others—always knew how to give apt expression and say what was on their hearts in a storm of anger without needing antisemitic words and labels, and certainly did not need to check the holy “Milog,” which is adding Judah and more to the reading.

Regarding the rabbi’s wearisome writing in books and in some of the columns: I understand that the rabbi thereby creates a certain filter and is left with readers from a very specific slice. I understand that there are things that require deep explanation in the medium of a lecture. But the rabbi himself has written here more than once that he wants to influence and change people—to make them think correctly, or think at all. I think the rabbi has countless approaches and concepts that are easy to digest and stand firmly on their own even without a lecture and verbosity. And it’s a shame the rabbi doesn’t devote time to them. I personally know several people who only from the last television interview with Arel Segal understood that there are thought-provoking things in the rabbi’s satchel and that one can certainly connect to them. It’s worth trying. (By the way, in many of his books the rabbi himself opens paragraphs and chapters with a quotation from a poem or an ancient Greek saying—it turns out that brevity too has a foundation for longevity.)

I liked what the rabbi wrote in describing the left’s demonstrations as opposed to those of the right. It is true and certain that among the Haredim every comma becomes an uprooting of religion and the piercing of the very core of Israel, etc. But the fiery demonstrations of the right, the national and religious camp, are indeed exactly over things that are the apple of their eye: uprooting people from homes, handing over territories, giving weapons to bloodthirsty neighbors, lawless construction and driving. They are on the front line to take the ricochets from every governmental decision. Their leftist brothers—even over things important to them—it always seems as though they are protesting something relaxed and delicate. They sleep well at night even when Bibi smokes and Sara completes sets, or when Haredim pass the chametz law, which in any case no one enforces. So far as these are normative people (and they certainly are), they are not crying out and mourning bitterly.
They are the reflection of Yair Lapid—a not insignificant rhetorician, but nothing throws him off balance or gets him speaking from his heart’s blood; who even remembers such a thing? Because in truth he has no reason to.
And therefore, why should they cry out over every foolishness or whim of the government, which in any case will never touch them or disrupt their routine? The rabbi himself says that all religious coercion merely breeds hatred and is unenforceable. (People marry abroad—they make a marriage agreement, etc.) What remains is only to go out to the bridge on Shabbat morning, stand with an Israeli flag, and catch a little sun.

Shabbat shalom!

Regarding Central European University, it still exists in Budapest but its center moved to Vienna in 2018. The fact that the government controls the universities is not connected only to “gender studies” (how many people study gender studies anyway??), but really to government control through political representatives in the bodies governing the universities (the board of trustees). Something that once was academic is now political. That professor of mathematics you know—how old is he? I wonder how many young Hungarian mathematicians return to teach there and at what level.

Wait—so who really determines what fake news is in Hungary? Isn’t it the court, which is controlled by the government?

I’m not addressing what you wrote about George Soros because he doesn’t interest me enough. I’ll just say that you have turned him into a demon, and perhaps with him too the picture is not as simple as you describe.

It is easy to find online data about people leaving Hungary. Apparently it is not an exodus, but still a very large number of people, and it is interesting to see from which class.

Yes, they were directed at you. I was not speaking about conservatism in general, but about one of its popular modes of expression (preserving “family values”). I’m not sure there is a definition of conservatism accepted by everyone who calls himself conservative, and in particular I’m not sure the definition you gave is such a one. According to that definition, indeed our “reformers” are not conservatives. They don’t have a drop of humor, for example. Nor common sense. Life experience? As what? What have they done in life, I ask sincerely? Rothman was some sort of lawyer, and Levin was in the Knesset, and his most senior position was minister of tourism (he was Knesset speaker for a few minutes). Tradition? In the name of what tradition do they speak? A tradition of enormous changes to the basis of Israel’s system of government in two months? Self-criticism? I haven’t found any.

My opinion is also not decisive. That is, I oppose the reform as it is currently proposed absolutely and decisively, but I am prepared to undertake some reform, so long as it is by broad agreement and backed by mechanisms that guarantee the independence of the judicial system.

I am not sure I accept what you wrote here regarding the difference between the protests (“the apple of people’s eye” is expressed in different ways among different populations), but I have a more interesting question. Why in fact don’t the religious and the Haredim join the protest en masse? (I know there are some who do, of course, but they are a minority.)
Do they not understand the madness of a fundamental regime change in a few months with no dialogue at all (and proof of this is that after a month or more of “discussions” in the Constitution Committee, the proposal going up for first reading is not substantially different from the original proposal)? Even without getting into the specific details, doesn’t that in itself worry them?
And if one does enter the details, it is even more frightening: complete government control over all branches of power (it controls the Knesset anyway: for the Knesset to do something against the government, it more or less has to commit suicide—I don’t recall a government being replaced without replacing the Knesset). What if the government changes one day? What if there are anti-Haredi/religious decisions in future governments (that is not entirely far-fetched), and they will not even theoretically have anyone to turn to? On an even smaller scale: how will you know that you have any chance at all in a government tender, or that the contractor building some project (like a train, or anything), knows what he is doing and is not simply close to some minister? How do such things not worry everyone?

So, briefly:
A. This is not full government control; it is the neutralization of political decisions by an unelected body (in fact the law authorizing the High Court to strike down laws—something they have appropriated to themselves without authority until now—simply requires that it be done in a full panel, which proves that this is not merely the worldview of whoever is responsible for assigning the partial panels. And as we saw with the “Deri Law,” they have great power in this regard).

B. The addition in your words about “they will not even theoretically have anyone to turn to” seems to me to provide the answer to your disingenuous questions.

A. It is full government control. According to the reform, the government chooses the judges, in all instances and not only in the Supreme Court, controls their promotion, and can also dismiss them (that is under the authority of the Judicial Selection Committee today).
B. So the problem is the word “theoretically”? I don’t want to give examples because I’m not an expert in this, but it seems to me there were cases in which the Haredim also benefited from the help of the court against the state (I recall something with a school in Emanuel, but surely there are other cases). In any case, yes, even theoretically it is a good question. By the way, already now, without any reform, there is a change (admittedly slow) in the composition of the judges toward more religious and conservative judges, so in the future it will already be much less theoretical even under the current system—so why change it?
What will happen if there is a government that passes laws against the Haredim? So because right now that doesn’t seem to be on the agenda, one can simply ignore it?
And allow me one more question, perhaps also disingenuous, but there is also the economic issue. We all live off the same economy, and when it falls, we all suffer. Clearly carrying out such a reform worries the markets (and it doesn’t matter who is to blame for that; it is simply the fact, so there is no point arguing about it), and it can lead to a fall in the value of the shekel, rising prices, etc. The Haredim too (perhaps especially they?) will suffer from that. Isn’t that a good enough reason to stop this madness and try to find something everyone can agree on?

My dear Itai,
I don’t know how old you are.
If you are young, I assume you will grow up.
And if you are older, you should practice memory exercises.
It will calm you greatly.
1992.
What was good until then
will also be good for the Haredim and for all those here who predict doom.
I am entirely in favor of the reform being done in stages,
like every change—or restoration in our case—
brings with it new and unforeseen developments.
But dialogue? With whom exactly? With those who call you
parasites and then run to check on Milog whether that is okay?

Before 1992, did the government control (through the coalition) the Judicial Selection Committee? That is new to me. Were the legal advisers appointed by the government? I don’t remember that either.

It is not a restoration. What they are proposing in the reform never existed here.

Dialogue is not between the Haredim and the secular, but between people who want the government to control the court and people who want the court to control the government. All the talk about “parasites” etc. is not relevant at all, and I don’t know why you brought it up. Just think for yourself whether you want to live in a state where the government controls everything in practice, with practically no oversight (and don’t tell me they’ll be able to strike down laws—who will be able? The judges appointed by the government and dependent on it for advancement? Judges whose level of ability no one knows, given that the important criterion for choosing them is their political inclination?)

Blessed is He who entrusted His world to guardians…
https://www.idi.org.il/articles/22273

Again, not precise.
Are you really not up to date, or…
The judges will not be appointed by the government, but “also” by it.
Long live the difference.
You should learn the reform first and not be terrified for nothing by exaggerated fear.
Here is the proposed reform in judicial appointments:
What is being proposed: the committee will be expanded to 11 representatives. For the first time, equal representation will be given to each of the three branches: 3 judges, 3 ministers, 3 MKs—chair of the Knesset Committee, Constitution Committee as representatives of the coalition, and chair of the State Control Committee as representative of the opposition. The majority required to appoint a judge will be a regular majority. In addition, two public representatives will be appointed by the minister of justice. The plan will balance and diversify the composition of the judges in the judicial system.

The dialogue is not between control by the government and control by the High Court.
Why minimize it?
There is a much more substantive dispute here.
And yes, the Haredim in particular have mainly taken hits from the High Court over the last 22 years, mainly from the left, while it tramples the law on the way.
Especially since electoral victory is assured to them, what do they have to fear?

Again, your lack of understanding of the other side is an excellent example of everything being cried out about here.
So please, don’t stop.

Thanks for the compliments. Apparently you are also not up to date, because Rothman has already declared that Levin’s proposal for the judicial appointments committee is “dead,” and the current proposal does not expand the number of members. In any case, the problem is what majority is required. What do you mean by “also”? According to the proposal, the coalition will have control over a majority of the members, and a regular majority is needed to appoint judges, so what exactly was incorrect in what I said? The government (through the coalition) will have a majority on the committee, and therefore the government will control the appointment of judges. Not “also,” but “only.”

I really don’t understand, which is why I’m corresponding here. Please explain to me where I’m mistaken in what I wrote above.

I’d also be happy to hear what the Haredim have taken from the High Court.

Demagoguery from the Israeli Institute for High Court dictatorship, who think we don’t know how the commander’s spirit seeps down to the very last legal adviser who is unwilling to defend the government’s positions on certain issues and castrates the government’s policy from the outset (from the right only, of course), and that we don’t know how in the disengagement the High Court decided that suddenly it does not deal with political matters (but they know how to ask, like our dear Itai, what will happen “if” the rights of right-wingers are harmed by the government… as if we haven’t seen it with our own eyes, things that happen every day).

Deacon, set your mind at ease.
1.
A. I did not rely in any sense on that dictionary, and your criticisms of it do not really interest me and are not relevant here. You can imagine that I know what an idiot is even without consulting dictionaries. I brought a dictionary entry to demonstrate that these words have meaning and are not insults.
B. Not right to use in whose eyes? I explained why in my opinion it is absolutely right to use them. You can of course disagree with me, but to claim that there are words one shouldn’t use is too general and unreasoned. By the way, if there is a traitor, it is definitely correct to use the word traitor about him—before Rabin or after him.

For some reason you dragged my name into your response, so I’ll answer.
I don’t want to get into examples regarding the rights of right-wingers that were harmed etc., because it is obvious that you feel your rights were harmed and I don’t want to get into the legal discourse about rights, especially since I’m not an expert. What is true, though, is that the situation can always get worse, and this reform certainly makes things easier for the government. For example, in the case of the disengagement, if it had happened after the reform [and remember that at the time the disengagement had a large majority both in the Knesset and among the public (according to polls; though not among Likud members), unlike the reform (at least in the first vote, the majority was 67 MKs)], there would have been no point at all in petitioning the High Court (which, if I am not mistaken, did take care of compensation for the evacuees’ rights—perhaps not enough, I don’t know). Now, at least, even under the current system, more and more right-wing judges are being appointed to the Supreme Court, and over time it is likely that there will be a right-wing anti-activist majority in the court.
The damage from this reform is clear to me (perhaps to you too?), but the benefit is not clear at all: maybe in the short term the right will succeed in carrying out its policy, but at what price? And what about the long term?

Someone has already compared this reform to brain surgery done in half an hour. There is something serious and huge here, and you are occupied with revenge.

How will a war of brothers break out?
When the side opposing the reform takes up arms.
“There are situations in which it is justified to resort to a war of brothers”—hard to argue
with such a general statement, but
does the rabbi think that passing the reform justifies a war of brothers?
Because that is what was implied by what Gantz, Hudak, and Huldai hinted at—they did not come to teach us a chapter in political science.

The matter under discussion is not interesting. It is only a war of control of Ashkenazi masters over Ashkenazim versus Ashkenazi masters over non-Ashkenazim, or a war of religions between believers and heretics, and of course a war over the public purse by pigs on both sides on the backs of laboring workers. Routine things.

What is interesting is the sacrifices that intelligent people make of their minds and education for the sake of their status.

When someone behaves foolishly or wickedly, that does not make him a “fool” or “wicked.”
When you call someone wicked, you classify him according to his overall character. There certainly are wicked and foolish people, but I believe that even you would admit that this is not true of Rabbi Shmuel.
If over every foolish thing that came out of our mouths in the past we become categorically “fools,” then you too belong among them.
I admit that in positive matters the custom is to be lenient and describe a person according to his minority quality, without being particular…

There is something to that claim. But from the context it is clear that the reference is to those things and in their light (or darkness). Many times, when a person says something stupid, people tell him he is stupid or an idiot, and that is the intent.

As someone who is not a regular reader (except for the recent period, to my sins, because they have multiplied), and as someone who does not vote at all, and as someone who fits no accepted definition (perhaps “a secular person who observes Torah and commandments” suits me), I see no problem or disturbance in the style. At times I even think it is restrained; and our Sages already said, “You shall not be afraid of any man”—do not gather your words because of any man. אמנם this is addressed to judges sitting in judgment, but it can be extended to everything when one wants to protest and rebuke—which is also an important commandment for all who count the commandments.
I have also read classically venomous antisemitic literature, and modern literature too (for study purposes, yes—also broad sections of Mein Kampf in its two volumes, and even inciting articles by Goebbels, may the name of the wicked rot), so I am not impressed by blunt style—not even in the style of “the new atheists” in Hebrew, English, and French; all the more so, Rabbi Michi’s rather sparse style is considered gentle in my eyes. But I am held by the saying of the wisest of men (presumably most readers of this site do not share my opinion that King Solomon was really a historical figure, Heaven forbid, since the archaeologist Finkelstein and company deny him utterly—even as a parable he was not) “The words of the wise are heard in calm”—one can protest, and one can even tell a person he is an idiot with a smile, and he will understand and respect you (from experience, unfortunately, by force of my work). Personally I do not define Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu as a rabbi, and I mention the title “rabbi” before his name because that is how the masses relate to him, and I have no interest in hurting any man or woman. In the same way, to distinguish between the living and the dead—I never referred to Rabbi Shach of blessed memory as “our master, the great one of the generation,” nor to Rabbi Kook as “our master, the great one of the generation,” but I always made sure to honor them when speaking with someone who held them as such. I am somewhat amused by the discourse in the comments, when no side takes prisoners; and how do they say in the name of Plato? (assuming there really was such a person) “Only the dead have seen the end of war…”
With the blessing of Shabbat shalom or a pleasant weekend—whichever suits you.

https://www.maariv.co.il/journalists/Article-981441
There is no coercion among the sane public… (only in Hungary, Poland, and the herd of Bibists).

To the rabbi,
1. You wrote: I brought a dictionary entry to demonstrate that these words have meaning and are not insults.
That is exactly what I was saying: Milog is packed to exhaustion with curses, insults, and slang, not with a search for meaning. And that is precisely my criticism of the places from which the rabbi seeks meaning.

Not right in whose eyes? You tell me. If you think it is right to use those words, then use them. What is the relevance of this or that dictionary? Rather, words also have meaning in the eyes/ears of the hearer, and one should give that weight before using them. According to your method, that the word “traitor” is fit for use, it is interesting that you yourself did not use it in your columns of denunciation that appear here and thirst for descriptive words.

To Itai,
As for Rothman’s declarations, it is difficult to argue and verify what he said and when. I heard that he told the neighbor in the building that in the end he does want to go with Levin’s plan. What I quoted is from the official reform materials that appear in the official documents everywhere and also on the reform website. And if that is not credible in your eyes, then there is truly no point continuing.
.

As for your question of what and how the High Court acted against the Haredim and generally against the state, I would have made the effort to quote it here.
Now I see that Rabbi Melamed has already brought part of them, and they are definitely enough to carry out the correction.

https://www.inn.co.il/news/592541

So you do not accept the meaning of the words as I brought it from the dictionary? Good luck to you then. I used the dictionary as a literary way of pointing out that these words have meaning, and that is what I intended, and therefore this is not a derogatory epithet. I assume reading comprehension at the level of a child is enough to understand this. Or do you think the meaning of these words is not clear to every person?
Indeed, crushing evidence from the word “traitor.” I am speechless. Be strong and courageous.

If you had phrased it precisely—“this is wickedness” or “this is foolishness”—you would have spared yourself a great deal of reproach from many whom the style bothered, myself included. I estimate that most of your followers expect from a person on your level not to express himself the way people often do. You are indeed a doctor, but also a rabbi, and as such the expectation from you is different.
Please accept the criticism as “the wounds of a friend” from me.

Accepted.

Proof for “parasite” from Milog as a literary device…
The Sapir Prize is on the way.
Go to dictionaries that respect themselves and see that the meaning of “parasite” is as it literally is, without the context of human beings. From here comes the argument over meaning.

I did not bring proof, and certainly not conclusive proof. As is well known, the rabbi is a treasure trove of such expressions and does not hesitate to use expressions far worse than the word “traitor,” and it was not for nothing that he went to… Milog. My point was that it is not found on the site, although it expresses a seemingly simple meaning.

Thanks. I was not familiar with those things. Clearly he writes from his heart’s blood, though I would have been glad if that article had at least given someone from the other side an opportunity to answer his claims. Notice that even in that article there is nothing connected to the Haredim, only things connected to settlement.
You write, “in order to carry out the correction.” Why is it obvious that this reform will indeed bring correction? I do not see how it corrects this. Perhaps it will lead to appointing judges on behalf of the government, who will approve whatever the government says, but who will guarantee you that in the future the government will also be for your benefit? Would it not be more logical to leave the situation as it is regarding judicial independence and continue appointing more right-wing judges, as is already being done today?
And if you are in such a hurry to make a correction, perhaps it is still worth thinking about the possible consequences and not only looking through the prism of revenge? For example, it is clear to everyone that this reform will make it much easier to carry out acts of corruption, small and large. Why should a judge involve himself in judging a public official when his advancement depends on that official? How will a legal adviser dare say anything to a minister when the minister can dismiss him? This is all so obvious; surely you see it. How does that not worry you?

Your conclusion, that his goal is to draw in “moderate” figures like Lapid and Gantz, is astonishingly ridiculous. Netanyahu understands that the High Court must be weakened for the simple reason that with all its enormous judicial power—he cannot govern, nor can future prime ministers after him in history. True, he has no interest in stripping them of all their power (as, on the face of it, passed in the first reading), since balance among the branches is mandatory, but it is clear that he wants a significant reform.

In order to think Netanyahu thinks otherwise, one really has to bury one’s head in the sand; alternatively, to listen only to tendentious speeches by the “gatekeepers” of “substantive” democracy. And… clearly Netanyahu agrees with these arguments, for he is a rational person. Isn’t he?
It reminds me a bit of hearing someone in the past suspect Maimonides of atheism, because how could such a wise man believe in religion? After all, “religion” is irrational by definition!!!
Well, the dogs bark and the caravan passes.

My response was directed to N, for the avoidance of doubt.