The striking political phenomenon of this Israeli campaign, like what has happened in recent years in Brazil, the United States, Italy or even France with the eruption of Eric Zemmour and the rise of the RN, it is an increasingly assertive extreme right.
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In Israel, this political sensitivity is embodied by a very provocative lawyer, Itamar Ben Gvir. Aged 46, round glasses and a wide white yarmulke still askew, he is an outgoing member of the Zionist-religious list. They were six so far, they hope to be at least double after the election.
Ben Gvir gives voice and sometimes more. One evening in East Jerusalem, during tensions between the police and Palestinian residents, Ben Gvir arrives at the scene protected by the police and draws his pistol… “Itamar, why are you holding a gun?” asks the journalist. “Because they are throwing stones at us! Have you seen what is happening? replies the lawyer, who continues: Friends, if they throw stones at you, you have to shoot them!” It’s the Ben Gvir style: always where there is trouble, followed by his supporters and by cameras.
This appeals to Yitzhak and Daniel, met at his meeting in Tel Aviv: “I think he says the right thing. He says what people think. Ben Gvir is a new politician, he brings something new. The others have broken their promises in the past so he has the opportunity to prove that he will do what he says.“, explains one. The second adds: “It’s like in Europe. We live in an extreme time so we need someone extreme.”
Itamar Ben Gvir is the representative of a religious messianic, identity and racist extreme right, opposed to a Palestinian state. There are countless anti-Palestinian and homophobic remarks within his party Otzmah Yehudit, descendant of a political party banned in the 1990s for incitement to terrorism. “It means Jewish strength. You have to place this character in the galaxy of far-right parties or populist parties that we know well today in Europe, explains Ilan Greilsammer, professor of political science at Bar Ilan University. What Itamar Ben Vir represents is the theory that if we don’t clearly crush the opposite side, we will be crushed. This obviously seems odd for Jews, for a people who have suffered from ostracism. But racism, xenophobia strictly spares no country and no people at the moment.
But the Ben Gvir team is trying to tone down this racist discourse. In this year marked by the resurgence of anti-Israeli attacks, the far right prefers to insist on security. In a meeting, instead of singing “Death to the Arabs”which has often been heard on the streets of Israel in recent years, activists sing “Death to terrorists”. And in Hebrew, it sounds almost the same!
Neriah, a settler from the occupied West Bank, thinks “stressed by the idea of a leftist government. This is a danger for Israel. We need security in the whole country. I think that if the Arabs understand that we are the owners of the house, if they play by the rules, if they realize it’s a Jewish state, if they stop the bombings and all the shit, if they behave like any other Israeli, no problem…”
“But as soon as an Arab picks up a stone or a firecracker, he must be put on a missile to send him back from my country. He no longer has a place here.”
Neriah, settler in the occupied West Bankat franceinfo
In meetings, in front of a young and 90% male audience, Ben Gvir’s speeches are successions of slogans, simple and short sentences repeated two or three times. For example when it comes to justice: “I want powerful courts, powerful judges, but I want politicians to be able to decide who the judges will be! It’s like that in all normal countries! When a new government comes into place, it wants its own agenda and it’s no shame to have judges with a Jewish Zionist agenda!”
The far right also wants to repeal the offenses of fraud and breach of trust, with the hope of clearing Benyamin Netanyahu, currently on trial. Because Ben Gvir is there to help the right-wing ex-Prime Minister return to power. This right-extreme right alliance breaks a taboo. If she wins, Ben Gvir will demand sovereign ministries in the most right-wing government in Israel’s history.