Saturday, 25th May, 2013
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Naomi Chazan is optimistic. This is perhaps surprising given that her current role as president of the New Israel Fund (NIF) sees her fighting daily for social justice and equality for all Israelis.
As we sit down for one final discussion before she steps down as NIF president this summer, the one word that crops up most, other than ‘society’, is ‘movement’ – both in a physical and a political sense. The impression is that the wheels of reform are in motion, albeit slowly, which is a far cry from the standard narrative of stagnation and deadlock one is accustomed to regarding Israel.
And Naomi has more authority than most to comment on such matters. Born in 1946 in Palestine, just before the foundation of the State of Israel, she has been intimately involved with the country’s politics and civil society throughout much of its history. Having politically “come of age”, as she sees it, around 1967, Naomi is able to comment on today’s contours with a long view that is frequently absent from much of the reactionary and knee-jerk debate found in today’s political arena. Furthermore, with a combination of a parliamentary career both in government and opposition, and a tenure as the chairperson of one of Israel’s most influential NGOs – the New Israel Fund – Naomi has witnessed the ebb and flow of socio-political developments here from a uniquely broad range of perspectives.
So it is with this in mind that one must reflect on her meditations regarding Israeli society today. There is, she concedes, much to be frustrated about. There is the “abandonment of the state of its social responsibility”; the illiberal economic policies which have created huge socio-economic inequalities just as the country has been experiencing sustained economic growth – a situation Naomi calls a “social powder keg”; the absence of “value-driven policies”. We have seen the creation of a “hegemonic system in Israel… [O]ne of uniformity under the guise of unity, one of nationalism as a substitute for values.” All these elements have led to a fragmentation of understanding between the government and its people, which has produced the almost impossibly divergent situation of an apparently polyvalent government which represents almost no one. As Naomi states, “It’s ironic – you’ve got one of the broadest Israeli governments ever, and frankly, the feeling of disgust on the streets is just phenomenal.” This then, is a much deeper-rooted problem than an opposition among equals – that is, within the political sphere, between left and right. It is a “vertical conflict between various sectors of Israeli society and government.”
To Naomi’s mind, the tectonic shift which gradually led to this chasm in the political terrain came in 1995. That year claimed two opposite poles in the Israeli-Arab peace process – the Oslo Accords and the assassination of then-Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. Long-held political views, scattered along the dovish-hawkish axis, were further weighed down by those cataclysmic events; consequently, the thin surface on which Israelis had been standing in some kind of unity buckled and snapped under the load. It is fairly straightforward to follow the path of the fracture since then, zig-zagging its way through history, society, economy and culture, and the dialogue surrounding those entities. And as the rifts in Israeli society have grown, so has the disenchantment of its citizens.
It is thus hardly surprising that the social protests we have seen over the past year exploded in the way they did. After all, a powder keg needs very little in order to be set alight. Out of the feeling of the disconnect with the political establishment, “civil social groups entered into the vacuum to cover what the government stopped providing over the last 20 years, in one form or another.” With this has been the sensation that the onus for instigating and maintaining change has transferred into the hands of the people; certainly, given the leaden-footed response of the government to last year’s social protest demands, one can be forgiven for no longer trusting the establishment to act in Israelis’ best interests. In this regard, today’s conscientious objectors to all that Israel must remedy within its borders are modern-day pioneers – although in an ethical, rather than physical, dimension. We are undoubtedly seeing the energy and challenges that come with striking out into new territory. Naomi does, however, caution against how we approach these movements, and how we conceptualise them. Firstly, there is the need to thread together the disparate elements of civil and social actions movements, which is “a strategic issue for all of us who care – how to garner these energies, and move them and shape them into a different mechanism to benefit much broader elements of Israeli society.” Secondly, when discussing the direction for change, she says:
I’ll start with something fairly unpopular. I don’t see social equality or socio-economic equity occurring without very clear state involvement and regulation… Anything serious requires a lot of state money. [The social protests] made very clear the difficulties around redirecting state policy, which is why you have a lot of movement at the level of civil society, but in terms of achievement, the movement needs to go into the formal political arena and redirect it.
Yet this is precisely the point at which Naomi’s optimism comes into play. The protests are, she says, ” something that hasn’t happened in a long time, and that empowered Israeli citizens and gave them the sense that they could make a difference, and increased their sense of efficacy.” There is the opportunity here to reweave the tapestry of the history of Israel’s social protests, and to take up the reins from “those of us who founded a lot of the peace and women and human rights’ movements. [Because] we also failed, frankly, because we never did very well in passing it along to those who are today in their late 30s, 40s, 50s. It skipped a generation. So now those in their 20s and 30s, are doing it in their own way.” It is this “revival of involvement in human, civil, diversity issues” which is the most exciting thing happening today for Naomi. There is “exactly an attempt to create a new vision that is value-driven, and in a sense to find a way to establish a decent society here, despite all the divisions in Israeli society and what’s going on.”
And this is precisely where the New Israel Fund, especially in the last few years with Naomi as its president, plays such a critical role. As she says,
…the framing of the issues has become much clearer – and not always for good reasons, but we’ve been able to formulate the key challenge, which is developing and maintaining Israel’s democracy in the true sense of the term – justice, equality. You really can’t solve anything without identifying the problem. Once you have, then you have tools – and in Israel you’ve had a very bubbly civil society in the last year. It may need a little direction but it’s there, people care. It’s not a lost cause, and I really think that gives hope.
And lest anyone be in doubt as to the significance of what is taking place, Naomi clarifies that “this is what’s going to make or break Israel – the degree of the robustness of Israel’s democracy.” So as to the current state of play, there is the sensation of coming back up to the surface after a prolonged period in the underwater gloom, and of a society desperate for air beginning its first collective breath. This is the impression that Naomi wants us to hold on to, while remembering that “[s]ometimes you have to go pretty far down to understand that you can get up and change things, and I think that’s exactly where we are now.” As for her message to all those seeking to engage with this project, Naomi is unquivocal: “If it’s broken, fix it. If it’s unjust, stop it. And if you believe in something, make it happen.” And with that dose of inspiration, Naomi has one last point to make: “I’m actually much more hopeful than I was two or three years ago. You can’t see it, but I’m even smiling now…”
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This Wednesday, 23rd May, Naomi Chazan will be sitting down with Tim Franks, former Middle East correspondent for the BBC and presenter of BBC’s Hardtalk, for an intimate and revealing conversation. To reserve you place click here
