Published: 30 August 2018
Last updated: 4 March 2024
This week, as the guest speaker at a gala fundraiser for the Jewish National Fund in Melbourne, the former Labor prime minister and military chief— avuncular, still taut at 76, and sporting a salt-and-pepper beard—deployed a vaguely analogous strategy.
He trumpeted Israel’s achievements as an economically robust, Nobel-laureate producing start-up nation, and canvassed the ever-present and evolving threats to its security in a neighbourhood tougher “than even Victoria,” before arriving at the sting in the tail.
On a night themed around the catch-cry that David Ben Gurion’s founding vision is “still young,” Barak repeated the prophetic warnings he’s been issuing in recent months around the world and most stridently at home: the Zionist “vision” of a Jewish and democratic Israel is under threat.
Fittingly, the war stories came first. In the Beirut operation, executed in retribution for the massacre of Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics, “they had weapons in their apartments and body guards outside the building,” he told the enthralled audience.
“I ordered the three squads into the building and remained at street level with a stocky blonde”— laughter— “and within a minute the door of a car on the other side of the street opened and a well-built guy with a dark moustache came out, opened his leather jacket, pulled out a handgun and started to cross the street. To this day I vividly remember the shock in his eyes when he saw the two young women opening their jackets and shooting at him.”
Decades later, Barak continued, terror persists: Hamas, Hezbollah. Al-Qaeda, ISIS, and above all, Iran and its hegemonic ambitions. He reiterated Israel’s right to act independently to stop the Islamic Republic from acquiring a nuclear weapons capacity.
"The current government is a legitimately elected one - but I feel it leads Israel in a wrong direction - which has to be corrected."
He praised President Donald Trump’s unilateral withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal, and the reintroduction of sanctions, for “causing significant internal and economic stress” for the regime in Tehran— a remark met with a smattering of applause.
Yet Barak is on record for acknowledging that the Iran deal, while deeply flawed, hindered its progress towards nuclear capability. The day before this JNF dinner, at a media lunch organised by the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council, he had confessed— colourfully—to “mixed feelings” about the deal.
“You know what is mixed feelings?” he smirked, winking at his wife Nili Priel. “When your mother-in-law drives your BMW over the cliff.”
On this night there was safer humour about the tribulations in his homeland. Moses was a stutterer— so when the Lord asked him in the desert where he wanted to lead the Israelites, he said “Cana, Cana..” God took this to mean Canaan, when he actually meant to say “Canada, or probably Canberra.” He also recounted a superb joke that a member of the US negotiating team shared with him and Bill Clinton at the Camp David summit in 2000 once it became clear Yasser Arafat would not go the distance for peace— but it’s too convoluted to report.
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“As for the Palestinians, here is a scoop for you: they are not easy neighbours, tell me about it.” But Israel has no interest in a full-scale clash with Gaza despite the recent violent provocation at its border fence, and the Israeli government “has a responsibility to reduce the stress on the 1.8 million Gaza citizens and focus our fight solely on Hamas.”
While no single threat against Israel can be ignored or underestimated, “I’m telling you here tonight in unequivocal terms that Israel today is stronger than at any point in our 70-year history.” It is the consensus of the security establishment that “none of the threats is existential.”
“I’m telling you here tonight in unequivocal terms that Israel today is stronger than at any point in our 70-year history... None of the threats is existential.”
Hearty applause. And then the former commando sprung his turn.
“The greater risk for our internal unity and our future comes from within.”
A sombre hush in the function room.
“It is the recent deviation of Israeli policies from the original vision of Herzl, Jabotinsky, Ben Gurion, Begin, Rabin and their followers. The vision of Israel as a Jewish state but a modern, strong and open one, a Zionist, democratic enlightened exemplary society in the spirit of our prophets and the Declaration of Independence. A light unto the nations.
“Make no mistake, the current government is a legitimately elected one - but I feel it leads Israel in a wrong direction on this issue, which has to be corrected.
“The essence of the issue is painful but simple. Between the River Jordan to the east and the Mediterranean to the west there live about 13 million people, 8 million Israelis out of which over 1.5 million are Arab citizens and 5 million Palestinians. If there is only one political entity, namely Israel, reigning of this whole unit, it will become inevitable— and that’s the key word, inevitable, that it will become either non-Jewish or non-democratic.”
Last week, in a speech to a very different demographic in Tel Aviv, Barak was much more pointed. He described the threat from within as “the dark, racist, messianic, nationalist vision led by Netanyahu and the extremists” and went so far as to call Netanyahu a “proto-fascist”.
WATCH VIDEO: Ehud Barak calls Netanyahu a 'proto-fascist'
Israel’s government needed to embrace three principles: security is paramount, the unity and integrity of the people comes ahead of the unity or contiguity of the land, and the Declaration of Independence is the nation’s de-facto constitution— a reference to the controversial “nation-state law,” which critics say undermines Israel’s founding principle of equality.
A closing motherhood statement of obligatory optimism. Generous applause. A standing ovation from about a third of the audience, perhaps because the audience skewed to an older demographic?
Last week, in a speech to a very different demographic in Tel Aviv, Barak was much more pointed. He described the threat from within as “the dark, racist, messianic, nationalist vision led by Netanyahu and the extremists” and went so far as to call Netanyahu a “proto-fascist”.
Tonight, however, was about raising money so there was no hint of such colourful language.
At the ritual exultation to give with abundance, a low murmur and shuffling of envelopes. Getting people to go on the record with their response to his speech proved a task.
“No, I don’t wish to,” said a softly-spoken woman. “The speech was interesting. Even if I didn’t agree with everything he said.”
“Well, look, I’m a right-winger,” a businessman who runs a popular Jewish store confessed with a boyish giggle. What did he think about Barak’s assertion that Israel’s greatest threat was internal? A pause. Another giggle. “I think he might be right,” he muttered.
“Happy for you to use my name,” said Michael Webb, a semi-retired investor. “I thought it was outstanding. I’m happy he didn’t have to toe the Netanyahu party line.” He throws his arm around his chair. “It’s exactly like he said. The future favours the bold. We can make peace from a place of strength.”
Photos: Peter Haskin/JNF
