The Tent Protests: A New Era In Israeli Politics?

Our guest author is Noam Sheizaf, an Israeli journalist based in Tel Aviv. He blogs at +972 magazine.

It happened almost overnight. Several weeks ago, there was a call posted on Facebook for people to camp on Tel Aviv’s Rothschild Boulevard, the city’s most prestigious avenue. Soon there were a handful of tents in front of Habima Square, and a few dozen students that threw cottage cheese packages (the rising price of which has become a symbol of the revolt) at Likud Party headquarters. This brought the media, and suddenly everybody is talking of a new political era.

The protest was started by groups of middle class Israelis in their twenties, living in the cities, who were calling for affordable housing and rent control. In the first week, they were joined by the students association and various grassroots movements and organizations. By the third week, the movement became much harder to define, and its goals were no longer limited to housing issues. It seemed that everyone who had something to say on social issues got on board.

On Saturday, Israel saw the largest demonstration over social issues in the country’s history, with around 100,000 people marching in several cities. Smaller rallies are taking place every day all across Israel, and more are planned in the coming weeks. There are 40 tent camps scattered in all major cities, including four in Tel Aviv alone. Rothschild Boulevard, almost a mile long, is covered with tents from one end to the other. Thousands of Israelis visit the place every evening. Political debates take place everywhere in the camp, signs and graffiti are scattered all around. There are daily screening of documentaries (followed by the inevitable discussion panel) and live music performances. Part protest, part political festival, this is something Israel has never seen before.

On July 26, a little over a week into the protests, Haaretz published a shocking poll: 87 percent of Israelis supported the protests. Various polls conducted later had similar results. Netanyahu’s approval ratings dropped overnight from 51 to 31 points. Government ministers were calling for an immediate change of the economic policy, and Likud education minister Gideon Saar warned the coalition, "In the past 20 years, every time the elections were about a social-economic issue, Likud lost."

The various tent camps are very different from each other. Some, mostly in the smaller towns, represent Israel’s poorest populations. In Jerusalem there is a strong showing of civil society organizations. In Haifa the students lead the struggle. In Tel Aviv the original groups still run the show, but the huge tent camp is very chaotic, with people walking around everywhere, handing leaflets or making speeches. By now, there are camps in Arab towns and even in a few settlements.

Yet, at its core, this is still a middle class protest: the messages heard over and over again address the cost of living, especially in the cities, social inequality and deteriorating government services (I wrote more about the economic basis of the protest here). But there is something else in the air. A general feeling of mistrust with all political parties — some members of Knesset were chased away from the tent camp in Rothschild Boulevard — and even a certain sense of alienation from society, which led several politicians, including deputy defense minister Matan Vilnai, to publicly warn of "the protest deteriorating to anarchy."

This atmosphere is so unique and unprecedented that it lead Atila Shomfalvi, political correspondent and analyst for Ynet, Israel’s most popular news site, to write the following on his Facebook page:

Any attempt to analyses the future political arena in Israel based on history and on the old lessons is bound to fail. Reality has changed in two weeks. Whatever that was would probably be no more. The greatest question is whether when the protest ends, the party arena would change as well, and who will be the new forces that would rise with the wind for the protesters in their back? And just as important: what would happen if a diplomatic-security element would re-enter the game? We could guess, but we better not.

One thing is clear: This protest has hurt Netanyahu. Not long ago, as the prime minister was preparing for the September showdown with the Palestinians at the UN, it looked as though he had most of the public behind him. Now, even the support he enjoys on diplomatic and security issues seems fragile (At the rallies, some protesters held signs declaring: "I don’t care about security, I have nothing to eat").

Being recognized as the prophet of neo-liberalism in Israel made Netanyahu vulnerable on social issues throughout his political carrier. And while there is no immediate threat to his coalition, the Prime Minister will have to be very careful now, as many in the public clearly blame him for their current financial troubles.

In the medium and longer term, the protest scientifically increases the likelihood of changes within the parties and new public figures entering the political arena. A recent Jerusalem Post poll had a "social" party winning 20 Knesset seats (taking half of them from the opposition). Elections are scheduled in two and a half years, but Netanyahu might be tempted to have them earlier, thereby denying new forces time to organize. As for dealing with the protest itself, as long as things don’t get out of control, I believe Netanyahu would simply wait for the heat to send protesters home, and if that won’t work, the rain surely will.

Some issues that these protests have raised, however, go deeper than the future of one politician or another, and can’t be dealt with simply through clever political maneuvering. It seems that for the first time in years, maybe ever, many Israelis decided to actively challenge the political and economic arrangements which have dictated policy for decades. Most notably, it’s the coalition between settlers, orthodox parties, the conservative working class and parts of the business elite that held the Israeli "center" together—whether under Prime Ministers from Kadima or Likud—that is now threatened. Not surprisingly, it has been the settlers who have expressed the most hostile responses to the protest, while at the same time, many of the people who actually voted for Netanyahu, Kadima or Labor have endorsed it.

The entire picture — tremendous public support for the tent movement (despite ongoing attempts to discredit it), the vulnerability of the major parties, and the decentralized, grassroots nature of the protest — show how disconnected the current Israeli political system is from the public, how fragile is the social order is, and what tremendous potential exist for major political changes in the years to come. If these trends continue, they could alter the way political coalitions are built in Israel, which could be the most meaningful political change since the rise of the Likud to power in the late seventies.