Benjamin Netanyahu and the poison in the middle

The year is 2013, and a voice rising from Israeli soil directly targets Netanyahu and his party. That voice comes from the Communist Party of Israel and the party's front organization, Hadash. Israeli Communists condemn the occupation Netanyahu is carrying out in Gaza and state that the crime committed alongside this occupation will lead to a region-wide war. The Communists also describe the government as “fascist and right-wing”; they say, “The tension that the right-wing government has been fueling since day one is dragging the entire region into a regional and dangerous war.” A solution is, of course, also offered: The struggle must be waged to end the occupation, and the legitimate demands and rights of the Palestinian people must be recognized.

The Israeli Communists are in the same place today. This time, the party, which condemns Israel's attacks on Iran, has also identified the power behind the attacks as US Imperialism, the United Kingdom, and European Allies. Moreover, they made this statement together with Iranian Communists (Tudeh).

The stance of this voice rising from Israel, the ground it stands on, and the principles and morality it embraces point to the source of the problem while also offering us the address of the solution. The problem, as stated in the declarations, is the ideology of Netanyahu and his party, and the solution lies in abandoning them. Not only in Israel but everywhere in the world, all policies and ideologies that absolutize identity, adopt imperialist ideology, and exploit religious and national values for politics with a bigoted discourse and a fascist orientation must be abandoned. This is the swamp; the “disease” stems from here, both inside our homes and outside.

So, who is Benjamin Netanyahu, the head of the “right-wing and reactionary” government in the words of the Israeli communists? What do we know about him; what was he accused of in the past, and what kind of family does he come from? Let us now take a short journey into the history of Netanyahu with you.

Netanyahu was born exactly 76 years ago, in 1949, just after the days preceding the establishment of Israel. When we say the establishment of Israel, the war began as soon as Israel was founded. The Arab League declared war on Israel. As you can see, the history of this never-ending fire goes back to the very first days. By the way, let us note that the first country to recognize Israel was the USA, and the first Muslim country was Turkey.

Let us return to Netanyahu. His mother was born in the Palestinian territories under Ottoman rule, and his father, Professor Benzion Netanyahu, was born in Warsaw. His grandfather was a rabbi. Netanyahu grew up in Jerusalem, but he lived in the USA between 1956-1958 and 1963-1967. He even finished high school there. Netanyahu, who subsequently returned to Israel, enlisted in the Israel Defense Forces, received combat training, and served in many military operations. However, Netanyahu's path crossed with America once again, and he studied Architecture there. Netanyahu, who completed his undergraduate education in 1975, also completed his Master's degree in Business Administration at MIT in 1977.

It was exactly in those years that Netanyahu changed his name to Benjamin Ben Nitai. According to his rivals, the reason for this situation is related to Netanyahu's lack of national identity awareness and loyalty. Netanyahu, on the other hand, says he made this change because “his name could not be pronounced correctly.” Returning to Israel after graduation, Netanyahu served as a captain in the Arab-Israeli war that took place in 1973. It was none other than him who worked as a salesman at a furniture company in the following years.

Meanwhile, his brother Jonathan Netanyahu lost his life in 1976 in a clash between the Palestine Liberation Organization and Israeli forces. Benjamin Netanyahu founded an anti-terrorism institute bearing his brother's name and worked there between 1977 and 1980. His real rise in his career occurred when he was only 35 years old. In that year, he served as an ambassador to the United Nations. Remaining in this position for four years, Netanyahu later returned to Israel and joined the Likud party.

Likud is an abbreviation of the Hebrew words “Liberal National Movement.” We have already conveyed from the statements of the Israeli communists what it corresponds to ideologically and how it interprets the world. Of course, there are also parties in Israel that adopt more right-wing, bigoted, and totalitarian views than Likud. In fact, they were also influential in Netanyahu's rise.

And then?

Netanyahu, who started politics at the age of thirty-nine, became one of the country's influential politicians in a short time, and when he reached the age of 47, he appeared before us as the country's Prime Minister. He is now the youngest prime minister born in Israel. Netanyahu, whose prime ministry lasted three years, left this post in 1999. Netanyahu, who held various positions, especially as a minister, in the following ten years, sat in the Prime Minister's seat again in 2009 and continued this duty until 2021. Finally, Netanyahu, who was re-elected Prime Minister in late 2022, continues his duty, as is known. His bloody duty.

There are a few more points we need to dwell on when talking about Netanyahu. One of them is about the corruption allegations made against him. Let us state that the corruption accusation we mentioned has been moved to the judicial stage and that Netanyahu has been tried within the scope of these allegations as a prime minister since 2019. So, what did Netanyahu, who was tried as a 76-year-old Prime Minister, say about this?

According to him, this case was “nonsense”; the three cases filed against him were a “political witch hunt” based on political motives. There is more; according to Netanyahu, this was an attempted coup. I guess it is not surprising; for some reason, accusing governments of “corruption” in the world is usually met with these words.

Well, could someone accused of corruption and even brought to trial continue his duty as Prime Minister? He had an answer to this as well. He said the following in court: “I am leading the country in a seven-front war, and I think these two can be carried out in parallel.”

Now, at this very point, please allow me to ask this question: Could the war policies that started with Gaza and continued with Iran have anything to do with the ongoing corruption case? According to some analysts, one of the reasons for the wars started was exactly this. That is, with the war policy being carried out, Netanyahu would suddenly take the cards into his own hands and rise from a Prime Minister to the level of a commander. So much so that in CNN International's analysis titled “Fighting Israel's greatest enemy instantly erased Netanyahu's political troubles,” the assessment that the Israeli Prime Minister had “once again firmly taken control of the country's policy” would be included.

In the same news, it would be commented that “the country's longest-serving prime minister pulled himself back from the edge of the cliff by launching an attack on Iran.”

As Clausewitz said, "War is the continuation of politics by other means." For him, no war should be handled and interpreted independently of current developments and the adopted ideology.

Let us continue.

The International Criminal Court was established in 2002. This court, to which more than 120 countries are parties, has made decisions about many names regarding various accusations to date. Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant are also among these names. Accordingly, these two names had committed war crimes, murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts. These expressions belonged to the Court: "..It is understood that there are reasonable grounds to believe that both names have intentionally and knowingly deprived the civilian population in Gaza of objects indispensable to their survival, including food, water, medicine, medical supplies, fuel, and electricity." Finally, the Court decided to arrest Netanyahu and Gallant.

These expressions do not belong to the people of Gaza or the people of Iran. These statements, voiced in the person of Netanyahu, are actually the condemnation of an ideology, chauvinist politics, and imperial thought. In this respect, politicians who act with a right-wing orientation, organize on an identity basis, and use all identities, including religion or nationality, for their political interests, wherever they are in the world, will create similar results. Of course, the time, violence, or dose of this result may be different, but this is the thought that lies at the source of the problem. The source of the poison, the center of the crime, is in these mental codes. The Communist Party of Israel is valuable for this. Because while voices similar to Netanyahu are spewing poison in the same lands, they are exposing this poison and voicing the conscience of humanity from Israel; they are showing how the politics and values that will be a hope for humanity will be built. Because the problem is in the set of values adopted; unfortunately, after being in that set, everyone is a candidate to be Netanyahu.

Finally, I would like to conclude my article by quoting a speech by Netanyahu.

In 2009, at a United Nations meeting, Netanyahu said the following: “Yesterday, a man who called the Holocaust a lie spoke from this podium. I offer my praise to those who refused to listen to this speech and left the meeting in protest... Every Jewish family, including my family, experienced the disaster. My wife's grandparents, her father's two sisters and three brothers, all aunts, uncles, and cousins were killed by the Nazis... To those who came here and listened to this Holocaust denier, I ask on behalf of the Jewish people, my own people. Weren't you ashamed? Do you have no decency at all?”

Now let us ask him:

More than 55 thousand people, including children, were killed in Gaza with your weapons; a settlement was turned into a bloodbath. Your share in similar murders in Syria cannot be denied. Now, the attacks you carried out on Iran together with your partner, the USA, are obvious.

I have conveyed the assessments of the Israeli communists above, and the decision made by the International Criminal Court regarding you has already taken its place in the records. As a member of a family that witnessed the Nazi genocide, are you not ashamed of the situation you have come to? As a member of a people who witnessed such pain, did you not feel any shame in inflicting similar pains on other peoples? Do you have no decency at all, Mr. Netanyahu?