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<\/a>What\u2019s the right way to beat the left?<\/a><\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/h3>\nRuthie Blum<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n In his Aug. 6\u00a0newsletter<\/a><\/span>,\u00a0Commentary<\/i>\u00a0magazine executive editor Abe Greenwald described that morning\u2019s daily podcast, which featured\u00a0National Review<\/i>\u00a0senior writer\u00a0Noah Rothman<\/a><\/span>\u00a0discussing the victory of\u00a0Dr. Abdul El-Sayed<\/a><\/span>\u00a0in the Michigan Democratic Party primary for the Senate.<\/span><\/p>\n The panel\u2014hosted by\u00a0Commentary<\/i>\u00a0editor-in-chief John Podhoretz and including senior editor Seth Mandel\u2014talked about how Republican Sen. Mike Rogers would be able to defeat El-Sayed in the Nov. 3 midterm elections.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThe basic question was whether it would be more effective to go after El-Sayed for his socialism or his adjacency to jihadism,\u201d Greenwald wrote. \u201cI suspect it would be profitable for Rogers to hit him on both counts, but there\u2019s a potential risk in focusing the race too narrowly on El-Sayed\u2019s radicalism altogether.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Greenwald explained, \u201cIt\u2019s become clear in high-profile elections over the past few years that naming and shaming the big, glaring, awful thing that defines one\u2019s opponent doesn\u2019t have the persuasive power we\u2019d like to think\u2014no matter how accurate the characterization. We\u2019ve seen this approach flop on both sides of the aisle and in primary races.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Which brings us to Israel\u2019s campaign for the upcoming Knesset elections on Oct. 27.<\/span><\/p>\n Greenwald\u2019s depiction ought to serve as a serious warning to every right-wing politician and pundit on the other side of the pond. This is because the energy invested in discrediting the left and the rest of the potential candidates whose main goal is to unseat Likud leader Prime Minister Benjamin (\u201cBibi\u201d) Netanyahu has been central to his camp\u2019s campaign.<\/span><\/p>\n The impulse to go after the \u201canybody but Bibi\u201d representatives is unavoidable. Take Gadi Eisenkot, for instance.<\/span><\/p>\n Currently Netanyahu\u2019s most serious contender, the former Israel Defense Forces chief of staff has been posing as a conservative when his past record in the military and overall political outlook indicate otherwise. That he tragically lost a son during the war in Gaza lends sympathy, if not credence, to the pretense. It therefore makes perfect sense for Netanyahu and his supporters to emphasize this point.<\/span><\/p>\n Then there\u2019s\u00a0Yair Golan<\/a><\/span>, chairman of HaDemokratim (\u201cThe Democrats\u201d). He makes no bones about his far-left positions and never has, including when he served as deputy chief of the IDF. So, unlike the case of Eisenkot, it\u2019s not necessary to expose him. It is, however, crucial to remind voters that he will be part of the next government in the event of a Likud defeat. Likely with a prominent role.<\/span><\/p>\n And, of course\u2014neither last nor least\u2014let\u2019s not forget\u00a0Mansour Abbas<\/a><\/span>, chairman of Ra\u2019am, who presents a double threat. An Islamist Israeli citizen who\u2019s a member both of the Knesset and a branch of the Muslim Brotherhood\u2014a group outlawed almost everywhere except in the Jewish state\u2014Abbas plays the \u201cmoderate\u201d card.<\/span><\/p>\n Assisting him in the endeavor is Yoav Segalovitz, who established\u00a0<\/b>and served as the first commander of Lahav 433, the Israel Police\u2019s national unit for combating corruption and organized crime. The law-enforcement honcho-turned-MK recently resigned from opposition leader Yair Lapid\u2019s Yesh Atid Party to engage in negotiations to join Ra\u2019am.<\/span><\/p>\n According to some Hebrew media reports, Segalovitz\u2019s move has caused a number of former security officials to consider following suit. Talk about giving Abbas a kosher certificate\u2014one that\u2019s even better than the one he received from former Prime Minister\u00a0Naftali Bennett<\/a><\/span>, whom he abetted to become premier despite a measly number of mandates.<\/span><\/p>\n Speaking of Bennett, he\u2019s another figure the right began attacking by refreshing the public\u2019s memory of the stunt he pulled in order to assume power. But attention to him as a force to be reckoned with is waning, along with his dropping poll numbers.<\/span><\/p>\n The above isn\u2019t merely \u201cinside baseball,\u201d Israeli-style. It\u2019s a snapshot of a situation with which the United States is contending.<\/span><\/p>\n Combating radicalization, which has creeped into the zeitgeist despite efforts to keep it at bay, is not simply the demand of the day; it\u2019s an existential imperative for liberal Western democracy and civilization. And though the tendency to sound the alarm on individuals running for office is completely understandable, it doesn\u2019t always achieve the desired results. On the contrary.<\/span><\/p>\n Greenwald offered a useful reminder of why. \u201cThe 2016 presidential election left no doubt about the exact nature of Donald Trump\u2019s flaming outlandishness, and he stunned the world by becoming the GOP nominee and then president,\u201d he wrote. \u201cStarting years before the 2024 election, Democrats made a full-time job of repeating that Trump was a threat to democracy, a sexual predator, a grifter and a convicted felon, and then he was elected president by a greater margin than in 2016.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n The lesson here isn\u2019t that it\u2019s useless to impugn an opponent. It\u2019s that doing so excessively can backfire badly.<\/span><\/p>\n Indeed, the irrational, obsessive maligning of Netanyahu by Israeli leftists and their fellow \u201canybody but Bibi\u201d travelers didn\u2019t succeed at their mission. Instead, they were pummeled at the ballot box in November 2022, ushering in the most right-wing coalition in the country\u2019s history.<\/span><\/p>\n The right should take this into account today. It would also do well to consider another problem that Greenwald elucidated: \u201cWhen a candidate makes his opponent\u2019s unfitness the central message of his campaign, he also makes the race all about his opponent.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Exactly.<\/span><\/p>\n If the right spends the next two and a half months explaining why Eisenkot, Golan and Abbas are the bogeymen, it will be turning them into the protagonists of the election. You don\u2019t have to be an expert in advertising to grasp that this is a way to build, rather than dilute, their brand.<\/span><\/p>\n Greenwald\u2019s prescription is worth noting. \u201cPerhaps the best way to go after a radical opponent,\u201d he suggested, \u201cis to get a jump on offering a compelling vision of your own that competes with the dark one he\u2019s peddling.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n That should be the Israeli right\u2019s strategy. Not letting the left off the hook, but preventing it from becoming the centerpiece\u2014and from disguising itself as the center.<\/span><\/p>\n Zawarto\u015b\u0107 publikowanych artyku\u0142\u00f3w i materia\u0142\u00f3w nie reprezentuje pogl\u0105d\u00f3w ani opinii Reunion’68,<\/em> What\u2019s the right way to beat the left? Ruthie Blum Israelis ought to heed Abe Greenwald\u2019s warning that \u201cnaming and shaming the big, glaring, awful thing that defines one\u2019s opponent doesn\u2019t have the persuasive power we\u2019d like to think.\u201d A polling station in Jerusalem during the second round of Israeli elections, Sept. 17, 2019. Photo […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[33,24],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132988"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=132988"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132988\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":133003,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132988\/revisions\/133003"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=132988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=132988"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=132988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nIsraelis ought to heed Abe Greenwald\u2019s warning that \u201cnaming and shaming the big, glaring, awful thing that defines one\u2019s opponent doesn\u2019t have the persuasive power we\u2019d like to think.\u201d<\/strong><\/h4>\n<\/div>\n
![](\"https:\/\/static.jns.org\/dims4\/default\/4828e27\/2147483647\/strip\/true\/crop\/4733x2665+0+490\/resize\/1000x563!\/format\/webp\/quality\/90\/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fstatic.jns.org%2Fuploads%2F2019%2F09%2FIsraeli-Election-Ballot-Box.jpg\")
A polling station in Jerusalem during the second round of Israeli elections, Sept. 17, 2019. Photo by Yonatan Sindel\/Flash90.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n
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Ruthie Blum<\/strong>, a former adviser at the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, is an award-winning columnist and a senior contributing editor at JNS. Co-host with Ambassador Mark Regev of the JNS-TV podcast \u201cIsrael Undiplomatic,\u201d she writes on Israeli politics and U.S.-Israel relations. Originally from New York City, she moved to Israel in 1977. She is a regular guest on national and international media outlets, including Fox, Sky News, i24News, Scripps, ILTV, WION and Newsmax.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n
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