New Government Offers A True View of Israel

Over the past several weeks, the rumblings from the new Foreign Minister of Israel, the right-wing idealogist Avigdor Lieberman, has met with predictable and justified derision from Palestinians and Westerners alike who see the aftermath of the new ruling-right coalition spelling almost certain disaster to any prospects of a two-state solution in the region.

To his credit, Lieberman appears to be assuming the mantle of agitator far too comfortably - recently stating that Israel would not be bound by the agreement reached in Annapolis (i.e. the roadmap to a two-state solution). Using the hackneyed conservative battle-cry of non-negotiation with ‘extremists’, Lieberman not only outraged the only partner available to Israel in the peace process, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, but sent the country into an almost certain collision course with the new Obama administration.

Shoring up the damage, Prime Minister-designate Benyamin Netanyahu quickly sealed a coalition agreement with Labour’s Ehud Barak - an all too transparent message to the U.S. that things had not yet ‘gotten totally out of hand’.

Forgetting for a moment that Ehud Barak as Defense Minister engineered the recent offensive in Gaza - and even neglecting the troubling fact that Labour governments in Israel have presided over massive settlement expansion in the West Bank over the past two decades - does this moderate ’shift’ to the left spell a more benign government - or rather, a government poised to take the necessary steps toward peace?

For those who have followed Israeli politics closely, it is clear that the ongoing policies of international belligerence and racial cleansing will doubtless continue - and perhaps even intensify given the empirical belief system endemic in the new ruling coalition.

Digging deeper, however, there may appear to be a modest silver lining - a bittersweet opportunity amongst the impending suffering that is set to befall the Palestinians (yet again).

For decades, Israel’s well orchestrated PR machine has been the envy of Western governments - successfully winning ‘the hearts and minds’ of Americans and many European alike - with charismatic spokespeople (usually assuming American or British accents) ready to defend the actions of the country on the nightly news or challenging television debates.

Israeli Spokesman to the UK, Mark Regev, Defends the Bombing of a UN School in Gaza in January 2009 on BBC Television.

While the PR is still very much in place, can it possibly be prepared for the daunting task ahead? With caricatures like Benyamin Netanyahu, Avigdor Lieberman, and even Ehud Barak set to guide Israel into the ‘Obama Era’, can the world fail to see what has been expertly polished away for so many years?

Perhaps the only positive effect of the ongoing rhetoric from ideologues such as Lieberman, is the slim hope that the world will finally glean the true policies of the Israeli government. Policies that are almost identical to previous administrations.

With the message remaining the same, perhaps the best hope lies in the messengers themselves - a government that cannot help but show their defiance to the West’s growing desire for a fair and just solution to the illegal occupation and rights abuses of the past 60 years.

At the very least, ambassadors like Mark Regev will certainly be working overtime to cover their tracks…