The Israeli Prime Minister reiterates Benjamin Netanyahu In his speeches Ze’ev mentioned Vladimir Jabotinsky, presenting him as his inspiration and spiritual guide, and that he kept his sword and read his works constantly.
Since the party took control Likud On the government, allocate Israel A day a year is dedicated to commemorate him, and a number of centers and streets are named after him.
In a study he published entitled “A Glimpse into the Ideology that Guides Netanyahu,” Ern Kaplan, head of the Israeli Studies Department at the University of San Francisco, believes that the current deadly Israeli war, which has turned into a humanitarian disaster, Palestinians in Gaza Reflecting an ideology known as “Iron wallIt was launched by Jabotinsky in the 1920s, and was the main inspiration for Netanyahu throughout his two-decade rule.
As for the American writer specializing in international affairs, Zack Beauchamp, he believes in an article he published entitled “The Ideas That Define Benjamin Netanyahu’s Personality” that the reason for the Prime Minister’s hardline positions, which sometimes lead him to disagreements with his closest allies, such as the Americans, is his affiliation with the oldest and most hardline Zionist movement that was established by Jabotinsky.
The author adds that Jabotinsky, who was born in Odessa, present-day Ukraine (then Russia) in 1880, produced an intellectual vision that eventually gave birth to the Likud Party and the hardline policies it has pursued to this day.
Scholars agree that Netanyahu’s policies, which do not listen to any objector, even if he is an ally, and his complete belief in military pressure, crushing and destruction as the only means to achieve security for Israel, are a literal embodiment of the ideas of his Zionist reference, Ze’ev Jabotinsky.
“The only way the Arabs can agree to a Jewish state in Palestine is by force that crushes them and subdues them,” Jabotinsky wrote in 1923, arguing – in complete agreement with Netanyahu’s current positions – that “the only way to reach an agreement with the Arab enemies in the future is to abandon every idea of reaching an agreement with them at the present time.”
Netanyahu.. Offspring of Terrorist Organizations
In an article published on October 31, 2023, entitled “When Einstein Called Those Who Have Ruled Israel for 44 Years Fascists,” Greek political scientist Yorgos Mitralias asserts that what Israel’s rulers are doing today is neither the product of improvisation nor a spur-of-the-moment invention.
Netanyahu, who broke the record for leadership of the Likud and Israel – according to Mitralias – is a true offspring of the “fascist” womb that gave birth to Menachem Begin, Yitzhak Shamir and other extreme right-wingers. He even has a direct and even familial relationship with the most extreme fascist wings, which were inspired, created and led by Jabotinsky a century ago.
Mitralias explains that the Likud leaders, with their heinous actions today, are not bringing anything new. This is what was preached by the organizations in which they were raised and of which they are still proud, namely the terrorist and fascist organizations (Betar, Irgun, and Stern).
He adds that there is an important difference between yesterday and today; at that time, Jabotinsky, Ahimeir, Begin and Shamir were notorious, and politicians around the world avoided their company.
Today, Mitralias says, the situation is quite different, as the notorious “fascists” and “terrorists” of 1948 have become not only perfectly acceptable allies, but privileged strategic partners imposing their authoritarian choices on most Western governments and countries.
What strengthened Netanyahu’s admiration for Jabotinsky and his thought was that his father, the Jewish historian Ben Zion Netanyahu, was also a Jabotinskyan, and was even one of Jabotinsky’s personal deputies.
Hungarian Jewish historian Laszlo Bernat Veszprémy believes that Netanyahu, as the son of a historian specializing in the history of Spanish Jews, believes that Jewish history is a recurring cycle of attempts to destroy the Jews from the Romans to the Spanish Inquisition, to the Nazis, to the Arab world.
Secular exploits extremists
In a study titled “Jabotinsky, the intellectual theorist of Likud policies,” Vesperme points out that it is ironic that Netanyahu is exploiting the religious right, which has become dominant in Israel, to strengthen his rule and continue in power, even though the intellectual background of the Likud party is a secular, right-wing Zionism known as “Revisionist Zionism,” which was founded in 1925 by the Russian Jew Jabotinsky.
The term “revisionism” here does not mean what the word conjures up in terms of a review of ideas and a tendency toward flexibility and moderation. Rather, as scholars explain, it indicates a more extreme Zionism.
According to Vesperme, what is meant by revisionism here is adopting a more extreme line that expands the circle of opponents and enemies to include the British who originally helped the Jews to create an entity for themselves in Palestine, since revisionist Zionism rejects that the British accept that there be a share for the Arabs, the original inhabitants of the land, in Palestine.
The leaders of this movement – from which the Likud was born – considered Britain an enemy and targeted it with criticism. Indeed, the armed gangs – formed by the leaders of this movement during the 1920s and 1930s to expel the Palestinians from their homes – expanded their attacks to include the British occupation forces and even some Zionist leaders from the other side who accepted the partition of Palestine, such as Haim Arlosoroff, who was killed in 1933 and some of Jabotinsky’s followers were accused of assassinating him.
Jabotinsky believed that the Jewish state should extend to its biblical borders, and he is the one who said, “The Jordan River has two banks, this one is ours, and that one is also.”
Jabotinsky and the Iron Wall Theory
The American writer Beauchamp believes that Jabotinsky’s vision, which was born from the experience of the Russian pogroms, is based on the assumption that Jewish life is inherently risky.
Netanyahu therefore believes that Israel’s strength stems from an idea by Jabotinsky called the “Iron Wall,” a wall that means overwhelming military force that guarantees the survival of the Jewish state and forces the Arabs to accept it.
Kaplan, a professor of Israeli studies, says that Jabotinsky rebuked the Zionists who saw the possibility of coexistence with the Arabs in Palestine. For him, no indigenous people throughout history would ever accept the settlement of another people in their homeland, and therefore they must be fought and crushed in order to control the land.
Researchers believe that Netanyahu’s implementation of Jabotinsky’s vision is very clear, whether in terms of intensifying settlement and refusing to give up any inch of land in the West Bank, which he sees as Jewish land, or through the policy of destruction and overwhelming force in the Gaza Strip.
No peaceful settlement with the Arabs
Kaplan believes that Netanyahu worked to kill the Oslo Accords, and considered the peace process with the Arabs a kind of peaceful settlement that Jabotinsky warned against because it meant showing weakness that would lead the Jews to destruction.
Netanyahu believes that the only solution for Jabotinsky is a strong Jewish state that rejects any concessions, identifies the threats facing the Jewish people and confronts them with an overwhelming show of force.
Researcher Vesprimi points out that the policy of normalization with Arab countries, which was strengthened during Netanyahu’s era and went beyond establishing diplomatic relations to cooperation in various fields, is also derived from Jabotinsky’s thought based on forming an overwhelming Jewish force that would eliminate anyone who thought of confronting them, and ultimately force the Arabs to abandon their leaders who adopt the resistance approach, and hand over leadership to what he calls moderate groups with whom the Jews can agree.
According to researcher Kaplan, the attack of the Islamic Resistance Movement (agitation) on Israel in October 7, 2023 It was an opportunity for Netanyahu to believe more in Jabotinsky’s Iron Wall theory, as he unleashed overwhelming force through a massive and destructive war on the Gaza Strip, which he repeatedly said would not stop until Hamas was completely eliminated.
Jabotinsky.. Mussolini of the Jews
Vesprimi asserts that Jabotinsky’s own followers described him as “Mussolini Jews,” and that Vladimir himself described fascism as “an entity operating under a single central command, in a single moment, proudly turning into a machine, yes, a machine.”
On this basis, Jabotinsky formed a gang of hundreds of young Jews, dressed them in uniforms and paraded them before him in a regular procession, where their steps and movements made them appear like machines.
The Greek writer Mitralias considers it ironic that Jabotinsky, motivated by his hatred of the Russian Revolution, allied himself with the murderers of Jews, such as the Ukrainian warlord Symon Petliura, whose army carried out anti-Jewish campaigns.
Moreover, according to Mitralias, Jabotinsky allied himself with the Italian fascist leader Mussolini, who Mitralias quoted as saying in 1935 to David Prato, the rabbi of Rome, “If you want Zionism to succeed, you need a Jewish state, a Jewish flag and a Jewish language, and the person who is fit for that is your fascism, Jabotinsky.”
Mitralias also considered it ironic that the current European and Western governments, led by fascists known for their racism and anti-Semitism, are the ones who support Netanyahu, defend him, and accuse every critic of him of anti-Semitism.
Einstein: Israel is ruled by fascists
The writer Mitralias points out that Netanyahu and his government are today doing their utmost to fully confirm what Albert Einstein already observed and publicly denounced in 1948, that “Menachem Begin His friends in Likud – to whom Netanyahu is the ideological heir – are racist fascists, criminals and terrorists who will inevitably lead Israel to its final destruction.”
Mitralias cited the text of a letter published by the Jew Einstein in the New York Times on December 2, 1948, in protest against Menachem Begin’s visit to America, in which he considered that the Herut Party – which Begin established and which would later be called the Likud Party – was very similar in its organization and political philosophy to the Nazi and fascist parties, and was formed by followers of the chauvinist terrorist organization Irgun.
Einstein stressed in his letter that the actions of Begin and his friends, the founders of the Likud, in the village of Deir Yassin A shocking example: On April 9, 1948, terrorist gangs led by Begin and his men attacked this village, killing most of its inhabitants (240 men, women and children), and leaving a few alive to parade them as prisoners in the streets of Jerusalem.
Einstein concludes that the Deir Yassin massacre shows us the nature and approach of the Likud leaders, who worked within the Jewish community to promote a bad approach that combined extreme nationalism, religious mysticism, and racial superiority.
Albert explained that the armed gangs created by Begin and his companions did not spare anyone from their violence, neither Arabs, nor British, nor Jews. Rather, they spread terror in the Jewish community, and subjected anyone who opposed them to beatings, robberies, and shooting.
Mitralias believes that the dramatic warnings contained in Einstein’s letter have been fully confirmed over the past decades by Menachem Begin, Yitzhak Shamir and Benjamin Netanyahu.
In his article, Mitralias cites another brief letter in which Einstein responded to a request for support from Jewish organizations involved in the massacre, which read: “When a real and final catastrophe occurs in Palestine, the first responsible for it will be the British, and the second responsible will be the terrorist organizations that are being formed among us, and I am not prepared to see anyone associated with these misguided and criminal people.”
Mitralias reports that Einstein refused an offer to become president of Israel from its prime minister. David Ben Gurion In November 1952, he succeeded Israel’s first president, Chaim Weizmann.
Israel is heading towards disintegration… and Netanyahu is looking for his interests
Greek writer Mitralias concludes that it seems clear that Einstein was right again, as the descendants of the “terrorist organizations” of 1948 are leading Israel toward “final destruction.”
“Israel may seem more powerful and arrogant than ever today, but in reality it is experiencing the worst existential crisis in its history. It is rotting and disintegrating from within. The countdown has begun and the moment of truth is approaching,” Mitralias added.
Beauchamp believes that taking Netanyahu’s ideological background, represented by Jabotinsky’s theory of overwhelming Jewish power, may help in understanding the disagreements that sometimes occur between Netanyahu and the Americans.
While some might think that the fundamental need to maintain strong U.S.-Israel relations might make Netanyahu reluctant to antagonize American presidents, Beauchamp says we must remember that Netanyahu’s priority, based on his ideology, is to deal with all threats with overwhelming force.
But Beauchamp believes that this does not mean that it is impossible to push Netanyahu towards concessions, as the ideological background is not the only controlling factor, but rather his personal political interests also direct him, perhaps even more than ideology.
