[Uri Dromi] Voice of protest in Israel says enough is enough

For the last few weeks, Israel has been experiencing an unprecedented phenomenon: Hundreds of thousands of people are rallying in the streets, demanding social justice. The numbers are mind-boggling: 300,000 Israelis is the equivalent of 18 million Americans. And this is not a one-shot rally. The protesters have settled in tents in the main boulevards of the major cities, and they insist on staying until the government yields to their pressure.

While around Israel peoples of the Middle East are fighting their oppressive regimes, and otherwise tranquil Great Britain is now shattered by violent riots, the Israeli protest is relatively calm. However, behind the generally good mood and civilized behavior of the protesters lie serious grievances. This is the Israeli middle class saying for the first time enough is enough. These are the people who serve in the IDF, who pay taxes and who want to live in Israel and raise their kids here, but find it more and more difficult.

When I was a kid, my family was poor, except that I didn’t know that, because everybody around us looked the same. Houses were modest, kids would transfer their clothes to their younger brothers and sisters and very few people had cars. We used to ride buses, or walk. I’m not romanticizing anything here. All the kids in my class were like that.

However, when I browse in the surveys of the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics, I find interesting data: In order to buy their house, my parents had to spend a sum equal to 20 months’ pay. Today, my kids have to work five times more, in order to have a house of their own. In other words, while they seem to be living in a more-affluent society, the division of wealth has shifted so drastically that their chances of gaining socioeconomic stability have diminished.

Housing is only one in a long list of problems. Social services are so expensive, and so are basic consumer products. Young couples find it difficult to raise more than two children, fearing they will not be able to support them. Unless, of course, they belong to the ultra-orthodox community, whose participation in the workforce is marginal, but its dependence on the national treasury is high. Right now, the protesters, wishing to be inclusive, haven’t demanded yet that this unfair deal be stopped. Sooner or later, though, there will rise an outcry, and an opportunity for a different, more-just allocation of public resources will present itself.

Political scientist professor Tamar Herman, a senior fellow of the Israel Democracy Institute, says that the protesters have exhausted the first phase of their political protest ― namely, venting their frustrations ― and now have to move to the next stage: defining their goals and negotiating with the government. It seems that this is exactly where they are now. Away from the media attention, their leaders are conferring with experts from all walks of social and political life in Israel. Soon they will probably produce a manifesto, specifying their demands for social justice.

The government, for its part, established a committee of ministers and experts that was given the task of coming up with recommendations in few weeks. Easier said than done. However, if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu views this committee as a ruse, a trick to buy time until something else regains the public agenda (like the expected recognition of a Palestinian state by the United Nations in September), he is making a major mistake. Governments perceived as deaf to the public’s grievances pay dearly at the ballot box.

Even if Likud stays in power, it will have to refresh its platform, basically reclaiming its original social roots. Labor, which has been considered a dead horse up till today, may be resurrected. All parties will have to ponder the new slogan heard on the streets of Israel ― “The people demand social justice!” ― and find ways to incorporate some of it. For a country still facing great challenges, where solidarity is the key to survival, this is good news indeed.

By Uri Dromi

Uri Dromi writes about Israeli affairs for The Miami Herald. Readers may send him email at dromi@mishkenot.org.il. ― Ed.

(McClatchy-Tribune Information Services)