opinion
Netanyahu, now is the best
time to act
David M. Weinberg
T he unjustifi ed wild reaction to
Minster of National Security Itamar
Ben-Gvir’s important 13-minute
ascent to the Temple Mount last week
tells us one thing: The world holds Israel
and especially Israel’s new government in
complete contempt. It thinks it can dictate
to Israel how it should administer the holiest
place (to Jews) in the world, how it should
defi ne who is a Jew, where Israelis should
and should not live or “settle,” when the
Israeli police and army can open fi re against
terrorists and more. The world is going to
object to almost every policy for which the
new Israeli government was elected.

My conclusion: Strike while the iron is hot.

The new government should move swiftly
to make its most important changes while
Israeli Minster of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir
it is still relatively united, and the world
is still reeling. A chorus of international
condemnations will follow in any case,
and Israel might as well plow through this
onslaught in a concentrated fashion.

Justice Minister Yariv Levin has set out
on this exact path by introducing a cluster
of legal reforms that in one fell swoop
will properly realign the balance of power
between the judiciary, legislature and
government. Not everything he is pushing
is perfectly wise nor will it pass Knesset
exactly as tabled. (For example, a 61-vote
Supreme Court override is an overreach;
On the immediate agenda is a proposal to expand
70-plus votes would be wiser.) But changing the way
justices are selected and canceling the ability of the access for Jews to the Temple Mount. Currently,
Supreme Court to super-subjectively and on a whim Jews are allowed to visit only Sunday through
strike down Knesset legislation as “unreasonable” or Thursday for a few hours each morning under tight
“unbalanced” is long overdue. No other country in and often-abusive Waqf supervision and to enter
the world has a Supreme Court so imperious. Israel via only one of the nine gates leading into the
Mount. (That is the Moghrabi Gate, whose decrepit
should implement its legal reforms as it sees fi t.

Additionally, change in the way the Temple Mount and rickety access bridge needs to be completely
is administered is long overdue. The so-called rebuilt, despite Jordanian objections.) Israel should
“status quo,” which was put in place after the Six-Day roll back these restrictions and revert to the
War when Jews and Christians almost always had “status quo.”
And while on the subject, I’ll add that I strongly
access to the holy Mount without restrictions on
days and hours just like Muslims, is long dead, oppose any thought of interfering with Muslim
killed by Palestinian and Islamic violence, seditious worship at the mosque on the Temple Mount. But
sermonizing and infuriating denialism, outrageous that does not mean that Jewish rights at the site
archaeological crimes, Waqf administrative should be delegitimized, denigrated and dismissed,
aggression and pugnacious Jordanian mission creep. or that the Waqf can wreak its apocalyptic war
against Israel without restraint.

I also oppose all extremists, but Ben-Gvir
did not violate any status quo by visiting the
Temple Mount. Previous Israeli ministers of
public security visited the Temple Mount,
too. And if the Jordanian and British crown
princes and the Turkish foreign minister can
visit the Temple Mount without interference,
so should any Israeli offi cial, rabbi or offi cer
be able to do so.

Any Western spokesman who repeats
the modern-day blood libel about Israelis
“violating” a Muslim holy site or “storming
the Noble Sanctuary” is baiting and
justifying Palestinian violence.

In a completely diff erent direction, reform
of the Israeli educational system is urgent.

This begins with rolling back the illogical
cuts in mandatory high school studies of
the humanities and Jewish history that
were announced by the terrible previous
Minister of Education Yifat Shasha-Biton. It
continues with a restructuring of the funding
system so that school principals have more
latitude in hiring and fi ring teachers and in
choosing extracurricular activities.

In the economic sphere, resolute action
is necessary to end the outrageous tax
burden on small and mid-sized Israeli
businesses, which pay 23% in tax, while
high-tech fi rms get a gazillion tax breaks
leading to an eff ective tax rate of only
13%. Small companies and big high-tech
fi rms should both be paying taxes of about
17-20%, no more and no less.

The Israeli left wing and ultra-liberals abroad
already are screaming that the legal reforms
to balance power “will bring about the end of
democracy,” that the lifting of the Temple Mount
restrictions “will bring about regional war,” but all this
is simply not true.

Israel’s best course of action would be to plow
through the overwrought criticism and implement
policy change with dispatch. What doesn’t get
done in the next six-12 months will get bogged
down in internecine squabbling or be impeded by
accumulated foreign pressure. ■
Photo by David Danberg / CC BY-SA 3.0hide terms
Israel should implement policy
change in a concentrated fashion
and plow through the chorus
of international criticism.

David M. Weinberg is a senior fellow at the Kohelet
Forum and Habithonistim: Israel’s Defense and
Security Forum. Originally published by Israel
Hayom. JEWISHEXPONENT.COM
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