Even I tripped up once and became a useful idiot of the Left. It was in 1992. Helena Rapp, 15, had been brutally stabbed to death on the seaside promenade in Bat Yam. I was experienced with demonstrations against Palestinian terrorism and with the media's coverage of those demonstrations and still went out to prowwww. The Palestinians were the great hope of the Left but all of a sudden the media aligned to the right of the protesters with a burst of support.
Only in retrospect did we understand that the generous media coverage was because of the upcoming election. Our demonstrations served the Left as propaganda against then-Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir. Shimon Peres spent half a day touring the streets of Bat Yam, on camera, "to meet the residents of the city and hear what they have to say." Pictures from our protest were screened as part of the Labor Party's campaign ads, which blamed the Likud government for the deteriorating security situation. In that election, Peres and Yitzhak Rabin beat the "weak-on-security" Shamir, even though Shamir – and then-Defense Minister Moshe Arens – had managed to suppress the First Intifada. With the Oslo Accords, the "strong on security" Rabin and Peres led Israel into a security catastrophe from which it has yet to find a way out.
Given my experience back then as a useful idiot, I want to warn against useful idiots on the Right in this election. When New Right co-founder Naftali Bennett attacks Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and says that it would be better for him to show strength against Hamas rather than against the model Ronit Sela – who spoke out in favor of Israel being a state of all its citizens and against the nation-state law – or when he declares that "Netanyahu is a coward," he is playing into the hands of the Left. Because the Left wants to make it look like there's no difference between Netanyahu and Blue and White leader Benny Gantz, Bennett is weakening the right-wing bloc as a whole.
When columnists and politicians press Netanyahu from the right to take immediate action to clear out the area around the Gate of Mercy in the Old City of Jerusalem or evacuate the illegal town Khan al-Ahmar, they too function as useful idiots. The Palestinian side understands that an election is a sensitive time that could bear fruit for them, and they will want to turn up the flames at flashpoints for the next little while. The purpose of their provocations is to cause a chain diplomatic-security reaction that results in chaos.
First, chaos is a basic element in the theory of extortion. Second, the Palestinians are trying to help the Left position the government as having failed on security and defense. If the Left rises to power, it won't be talking about evacuating the Gate of Mercy area or Khan al-Ahmar – it will be talking about evacuating Judea and Samaria and handing them over to the Palestinians. Then the Palestinians will be able to get everything they couldn't in the years Netanyahu wore down the vision of a Palestinian state. The lesson we've learned, repeatedly, from the pursuit of ideologically uncompromising right-wing positions is that perfect is the enemy of the good. We pay the price for that for generations. That is what happened in 1992, when the Shamir government was brought down because the prime minister attended the Madrid summit, and that is how it was in 1999 when the Right brought down the Netanyahu government because it was afraid he would make territorial concessions – which led to a government under Ehud Barak and the outbreak of the Second Intifada.
The ideological Right must reassess the situation and set priorities: Since the political Right under Netanyahu has managed to prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state and is managing the world's battle against Iran wisely, the ideological, responsible Right must stop these attacks on Netanyahu and his government. Members of the national camp should concentrate on their work and on bringing voters to the polls. Outflanking on the Right can wait another 30 days.
